i LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.! 



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i UNITED STATES OP AMERICA J 



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RELIGIOUS PHILOSOPHY 

IN 

LETTERS TO A MAN OF THE WORLD 

DISPOSED TO BELIEVE. 

BY 

J. E . L E BOYS DES GUAYS, 

EDITOR OF "LA NOUVELLE JERUSALEM." 

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, 
BY 

JOHN MURDOCK. 



THIRD EDITION, 

REVISED AND CORRECTED BY 

GEORGE BUSH, 

PROFESSOR OF HEBREW IN THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK 



FIRST AND SECOND SERIES. 



BOSTON: 
PUBLISHED BY OTIS CLAPP, 

3 Albion Building, Beacon Street. 

■7 1857. 



4 



PREFACE 

TO THE SECOND EDITION. 

The first edition of this work having been exhausted some months 
since, it has been deemed desirable to issue it in a new and improved 
form. With this view it has been subjected to a rigid revisal, and 
now makes its appearance in a style of execution in some degree 
worthy of its invaluable contents. It would not be easy to point to 
any single work illustrative of the conjoint philosophy and theology 
of Swedenborg, more happily adapted to its end. Taking the dis- 
turbed but meditative skeptic in the crisis of his mental conflicts, 
he leads him gently onward, from certain rudimentary principles of 
belief, through a series of well compacted and consecutive reason- 
ings to the grand conclusions embodied in the faith of the New 
Church. The evolution of the argument is so skillfully conducted 
— one step of the demonstration rises so naturally from another— 
every difficulty proposed is so luminously cleared up — that admission 
after admission is forced from the doubter, tili at length the momen- 
tous result is seen to be inevitable — man is immortal ; there is a 
heaven and a hell ; he lives as perfect a man after death as before ; 
he dwells in a spiritual body, in a spiritual world ; that world is 
replete with objective scenery suited to the senses which take cog- 



vi 



PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 



nizance of it ; his destiny there is the necessary product of his life 
and character here; and every conclusion reached on the subject by 
the fairest reason goes to confirm the truth of .Revelation. 

Considering the profound and abstruse nature of the subjects 
treated, the work will be seen to be extremely felicitous in the clear- 
ness of it? expositions, and a certain attractive simplicity in the 
style relieves the mind from that latent oppression which it some- 
times experiences under the continuous influx of new ideas. 

It will be seen, in the concluding letter, that a second series is 
promised, relating mainly to the principles on which the inspired 
Word is constructed, and by which it is to be interpreted. We are 
happy to announce, that in the present edition of the work, this series 
of Letters, as far as published, has been added to the preceding. This 
may perhaps enhance somewhat the price of the volume, but no reader 
of the first we presume would willingly dispense with the second. The 
whole will be found to contain a most able and beautiful expose of the 
leading disclosures of Swedenborg, relative to the philosophy of the 
universe and the constitution of the Divine Word. 

New York, April i, 1848. 0. B, 



CONTENTS. 



PART L 

LETTER. I — Introductory. — Unhappiness of a Skeptical State of 
Mind. — The Being of a God and the Immortality of the Soul. — 
Reason not to be laid aside in Theological Inquiries. — Conditions 
of the Discussion. ... . Page 5. 

LETTER II.— Consistency of the Existence of Evil with the Idea of 
a God essentially good and all-powerful. — Creation originating 
in a Spiritual Sun. — Man a free Agent. — -The Laws of Divine 
Order. - Page 10. 

LETTER III. — The surest Means of conducting Man to true religious 
Principles, to assure him of his Immortality. Page 20. 

LETTER IV.— Of Spiritual Substances and Forms.— God Very Man, 
the Man-Type. — The Soul an Image of God, a substantial Being, 
having a Spiritual Body, endowed with all the organs which 
constitute the terrestrial Body with which it is clothed. Page 28. 

LETTER V.— Demonstration of the Immortality of the Soul or of 
the Man-Spirit. — Digression respecting the Nature of An- 
gels. ... Page 43. 

LETTER VI.— Exposition of the Spiritual World.— The Relations 
which exist between God, the Spiritual World, and the Natural 
World. — End, Cause, and Effect. — The Spiritual World, a real 
World corresponding to ours. — Digression concerning Space and 
Time Page 57 



viii 



CONTENTS, 



LETTER VH.— Answer to an Objection.— Solution of the Problem 
of the Soul of Beasts. — Man the only Being endowed with Iin 
mortality Pa^e 72 

LETTER, Vm.— Of the Creation of the Universe.— Questions on this 
Subject, — Considerations on the Infinite. — God only Infinite. — 
God did not create the Universe out of nothing, but from Him- 
self by Emanation. — The Universe distinct from the Creator. — 
Of the Spiritual Sun and the Natural Sun. — Theory of Atmo- 
spheres. — Confirmation of this Theory drawn from Modern Sci- 
ence Page 86 

LETTER IX.— The Impossibility of forming an Idea of the Creation 
of the Universe, unless God be regarded as Man. — Survey of the 
Universe in its general primitive Constitution. — Correspondence 
between the Spiritual and Natural Earths. — View of the Exte- 
rior Manifestation of the Spiritual "World. — Division into three 
Heavens. — Nature of the Spiritual Earths.— Changes effected 
by the Fall of Man. — The Fall progressive and not instanta- 
neous. — The Law of Transmission by Germs. — Of Hell ; Man 
alone has produced it. — How it is to be understood that Man 
has the power of creating Hell.-- Of a mixed Spiritual Organ- 
ism, or of the World of Spirits.. . . Page 105 

LETTER X.— New View of the Nature of Angels.— All the intel- 
ligent Beings who people the immaterial World, are Men that 
have originally dwelt upon the natural Earths.— The Formation 
of the Universe gives an Idea of the Formation of Man. — First 
Investigation relative to Spiritual Beings. — Of Influx, or the 
Manner in which Life penetrates to the Inhabitants of the 
Spiritual World, and consequently to Man. — The Connexion be- 
tween the two Universes and the Indestructibilty of the Mate- 
rial Universe. ....... Page 120. 

LETTER XL — Each general Division of the Spiritual World in the 
human Form. — Does it follow that the natural Universe has 
this Form ? — Simple Survey of our Universe as the modern As- 



CONTENTS, jx 

tronomy presents it. — Is there a central Sun around -which all 
other Suns revolve ? — The Universe not Infinite though indefi- 
nitely extended Page 141 

LETTER XII.— The preceding Ideas on the Deity perfectly consis- 
tent with the Doctrines of True Christianity.— Application of 
these Ideas to 1st, Redemption, 2dly, the Trinity. — Sequel to the 
Exposition of the Spiritual World ; Questions of Details.— Pas- 
sage of Man from this Life into the other. — Of the intermediate 
World. — Digression concerning Correspondences. — The Spirits 
of that World do not live isolated, but in Societies, like Men in 
the present World. . ... Page 158. 

LETTER XIII. — The Language of Spirits in their Intercourse with 
each other.— Digressions ; 1st, On Man's Memory ; 2d, On his 
Thought. — The Language spoken in the world of Spirits the true 
Universal Language Page 183. 

LETTER XIV.— Of the Form of the Man-Spirit during his sojourn 
in the World of Spirits. — Why Man grows old in the Natural 
World, and does not grow old in the Spiritual World. — Terres- 
trial Immortality would have been for Man an insupportable 
Burden. — In the Spiritual World the Old Man and the Infant 
become Men in the Flower of their Age, the one receding, and 
the other advancing to that Point. — How Youth is renewed in 
the Spiritual World. — Examples. — .The Trinity in the Person of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, and the true Nature of his Human- 
ity. . .... Page 200. 



PART H. 

LETTER I.— The Understanding not to be blinded in dealing with" 
Religious Truth. — Intellectual Conviction not the same with 
True Faith. — Quotations from Swedenborg, respecting the Affir- 
mative and Negative Principle. — Plan of the ensuing Discus- 
sion Page 215 



X CONTENTS. 

LETTER II— Historical expose of the Word from the Origin of all 
tilings. — True Tlieory of the Creation. — Proceeded from the 
Divine Word as the Divine Wisdom — The Word in the Most 
Ancient Church not written, but inwardly revealed. — By the 
Fall, the Spiritual Man of the Most Ancient Church became 
closed, and hence the necessity of a New Form of the Word, — 
A new Church, called the Ancient Church, instituted, to which 
was given a Written Word.-^Embodied the Remains of the Doc- 
trinals of the former Church. — Consisted of Representatives 
founded upon Correspondences.— As the Ancient Church de- 
clined, the Key to the Science of Correspondences was gradually 
lost. — The Jewish Church then instituted, and a New Dispensa- 
tion of the Word granted them, but still constructed on the 
Principle of Correspondences. — Nature of its Inspiration.— Its 
internal Sense revealed for the Use of the New Church.Page 223 

LETTER m.— Analogy between the Word of Man, and the WORD 
of God. — Difference between the two. — The Word of God inex- 
• haustible, because, Infinite like its Author. — Prejudices : (1st), 
The Jews considered as the People of God. (2d), The Penta- 
teuch considered as the Source of the Ancient Religion. — Ob- 
stacles ; (1st), God represented as subject to Human Passions. 
(2d), Facts and Expressions that offend against Morality. (3rd), 
Assertions considered as unworthy of God : Inconsistencies ; con- 
tradictions. — Why this new Revelation was not sooner made 
known to the World, —Would not have been received. — The 
Sadducees of old less culpable than the Pharisees. — The mod- 
ern Pharisees, representing Theology, more opposed to the Doc- 
trines of the New Church than the modern Sadducees, repre- 
senting Philosophy. . ... Page 240. 



LETTERS 



TO A MAN OP THE WORLD, 



LETTER I. 

Like yourself, sir, I have been a prey to that moral malady, 
that spiritual stupor, which has resulted from the philosophy 
of the last age. All that you say, therefore, respecting the 
state of mind you are in, does not surprise me, I know by 
experience, how painful, how insupportable is doubt. I have 
experienced all the intellectual phases through which you have 
passed. In vain we have recourse to the sciences, the arts, or 
to high philosophy ; in vain we throw ourselves into the vor- 
tex of business, or give ourselves up to the pleasures of the 
world ; all this will not remove doubts from the mind of a man 
who is disposed to serious meditation. This state, you say, 
is very painful : certainly it is, for such doubt, like the vexa- 
tion mentioned by the poet, incessantly rides behind its victim. 
Happy, however, are they, who in this age of religious indiffer- 
ence feel the agonies of doubt. The necessity of being relieved 
from such a state of mind excites them to enquiry : and who- 
ever perseveres in such an enquiry, will be satisfied in the end. 
Your state is that of a sick man who knows his disease, and 
feels all its attacks, but who, on that account, can be restored 
to health. Would you not be more deserving of pity if, like 
the greater part of your associates, you were in a state of com- 
plete indifference 1 You would then resemble a paralytic 



6 



LETTERS TO A 



who feels no pain, but for whom there is no hope of recovery 
while this fatal insensibility continues. 

You are disposed to become a believer, without however, as 
you add, being compelled to renounce your understanding. I 
accept very willingly this restriction ; it accords so much with 
my own views, that I should have proposed the reservation to 
you, if you had not mentioned it yourself. When I discuss 
any subject of religious philosophy with an unbeliever, I am 
careful not to say to him, " Lay aside your understanding and 
and believe blindly for this would certainly either break off 
the discussion, or render it altogether useless. I induce him, 
on the contrary, to make all objections which the subject 
allows of. I go so far even as to point out those which do not 
occur to him, in order that new doubts may not afterwards 
arise in his mind ; for experience proves that a man does not 
arrive at a real conviction, on a controverted subject, only so far 
as he examines it in all its bearings, in the full exercise cf his 
liberty and rationality. Truths can only enter the mind of man 
gradually, and in proportion as opposing errors are removed ; 
and errors can only be removed so far as man acknowledges 
freely and rationally that what he believed to be true is false. 

Thus so far from wishing to trammel our future discussion, I 
give it, as you see, the greatest latitude. And now, let us 
define, as far as possible, our positions respectively. I see 
from your letter, that you acknowledge a God distinct from 
nature, and that there is no doubt in your mind on this impor- 
tant point. You are in this, much farther advanced than most 
persons that are met with in society ) for though it is not any 
longer the fashion publicly to deny the being of a God, yet 
how numerous are they, especially in the learned world, who 
make no distinction between God and nature ! Question them 
on this subject, and they will at once declare that they admit 
the existence of God, but if they are pressed with questions, 
it will easily be perceived that in their minds they confound 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



7 



tms God with nature, When it is a principle with a person 
not to admit anything as existing but what he apprehends 
with his corporeal senses, he is driven to this lamentable 
result. You do not find yourself very happy in this sad posi- 
tion, which I have likened to the state of a paralytic who feels 
not his malady. If you suffer, it is because your belief is 
limited to the acknowledgment that there is a God, the Creator 
of nature, and that, on all the other questions, you remain in a 
distressing uncertainty. For instance, relative to the immor- 
tality of the soul, you have nothing but probabilities; you 
have no certainty. The arguments of philosophy, and those 
of Roman Catholicism, in which religion you were born, are 
far from being satisfactory to your mind. You are desirous of 
believing that you live after death, because you feel in your- 
self something which tells you that the existence of man can- 
not be limited to the miserable life he leads upon this earth ; 
but when your attention has been directed to all that has been 
told you on the subject of the human soul, you find the 
hypotheses of philosophers, and the ideas of theologians so 
vague, so incoherent, and so little in agreement with interior 
sentiments, that you are obliged to reject both. 

With respect to the interior sentiment, or interior views and 
perceptions, let me here make an observation : it is, that the- 
ology and science, in putting forth fine treatises on the immor- 
tality of the soul, without previously giving any clear idea on 
the soul itself, have obscured the question rather than thrown 
light upon it; and that upon this subject, the ideas of a little 
child that has lost its mother, or those of an honest peasant 
who laments the loss of his companion, approach much nearer 
to the truth, as you will hereafter acknowledge, than those of 
a learned doctor of Sorbonne ; or of a profound philosopher. I 
should not then be astonished at the little advantage you have 
derived from perusing these treatises. 

Your wish to become a belie7er, without giving up the use 



8 



LETTERS TO A 



of your reason ; shows me clearly why you have addressed 
yourself to a member of the New Jerusalem, rather than to a 
theologian of the Old Church. You have thought, no doubt, 
that a religion appearing in this age of rationalism, ought not 
to exclude reason from its religious philosophy, and in that 
you are not mistaken ) but if you should think that the mem- 
bers of the New Jerusalem, like those innovators we see rising 
up on all sides, reject the Christian religion, you would be 
seriously mistaken. The New Jerusalem rests on Christian- 
ity, as Christianity rests on the Law and the Prophets. It does 
not abolish, but repairs and completes. We are, therefore, 
Christians ; we are Christians in the broadest sense of the 
term — as you will be convinced when you understand the 
principles of the Lord's New Church. 

Now that it is established that you are an unbeliever disposed 
to believe^ provided you are not required to make a sacrifice of 
your reason, and that I am a Christian in the fullest accepta- 
tion of the term, that is to say, admitting, from the sincerest 
conviction of its truth, all that the New Jerusalem teaches, 
our respective positions are sufficiently defined for the present. 
The discussion now to follow can alone show to you what the 
name of Christian fully implies in the New Church. 

We might now enter upon the subject, but before doing so, 
it will be well for us to understand each other on certain points 
relating to the argumentation. I shall point out in this first 
letter, such as appear to me the most important. 

You wish to be convinced by reason ) to your reason then, 1 
must address myself. Now, in a subject so elevated, where 
we have to treat of God and his attributes, of the soul and its 
immortality, and in general of a world invisible to our natural 
or material eyes, your reason tells you that you cannot require 
natural or material proofs, or in other words, proofs which 
strike the senses of your earthly body. As for the rest, I do 
not think that your reason will refuse to admit the arguments 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



jvhich I shall offer. I will not depart from the rules of good 
logic, and I shall follow, as much as possible, the method of 
geometricians. Like them, I shall go from the known to the 
unknown \ and like them, I shall have recourse to proofs from 
analogy. Now this kind of demonstration, it being admitted in 
the exact sciences, you cannot decline to accept. Lastly, when 
I shall speak to you of the spiritual world, I shall require you 
to abstract time and space, as in geometry they must abstract 
one or many dimensions of bodies, or as in mechanics, they 
must abstract movement, resistance of the air, friction, &c. 

If this manner of treating rationally, and, so to speak, mathe- 
matically, the great question of religious philosophy, should 
excite your astonishment by its novelty, I would say to you : If 
a divorce has taken place between religion and reason, it is 
men alone who have caused it. God has never reproved rea- 
son because it was reason \ but from the moment when man 
himself had perverted his noble faculty which he derived from 
God, things spiritual and celestial could no longer gain access 
to his corrupted reason. And as to the method of the geome- 
tricians, how could it be opposed to divine science ? Do we 
not say, speaking of God, that he is the great Geometrician, 
that is, the Architect of the universe ? Is not God the Archi- 
tect of those globes which turn above our heads, according to 
laws mathematically established % Besides, have not the sci- 
ences also their metaphysical part? Ask the metaphysicians, 
who have entered into the depths of infinitesimal calculation, 
and they will confess that many among them, struck with the 
results to which they were conducted, have from materialists, 
which they were before, become spiritualists. 

You see, moreover, that in all this, we have only to do with 
high questions of religious philosophy. As to those which 
relate to doctrine, properly so called, it would be quite out of 
place to mention them now. We must wait till the philosph- 
ical errors which would oppose themselves to their admission 



10 



LETTERS TO A 



have been dispelled from your mind, and the spimual truths 
which shall gain an entrance with you, have disposed you to 
receive them favorably. In a word, it is necessary that your 
convictions be well established on the questions to which our 
attention is to be first directed ) but be it well remembered, 
that however strong this conviction may be, nevertheless it 
will not be faith ) but it will conduct you to the faith which 
God alone gives to man when man is prepared to receive it. 

Before closing this letter, I must make another observation : 
Though the New Jerusalem Church is in possession of truths 
of a very elevated order, and can by their means, resolve 
many questions which had hitherto remained without solution, 
she is, notwithstanding, far from pretending to explain every- 
thing. The intelligence of the creature, be he man or angel, 
will never be so far elevated as to comprehend the Creator. 
To comprehend God in his infinite Essence, it is necessary to 
be God himself. Accept, &c. 



LETTER n. 

The conditions which I proposed to you, relative to the 
mode of discussion, were so conformable to the reasoning 
spirit of our age, that I was convinced you would accept them ; 
and I would in my first letter ha ye introduced the subject, had 
I not been prevented by a motive altogether personal to your- 
self. When an author undertakes a treatise ex professo, he 
can arrange his plan himself, and treat it as he pleases ; but 
such is not my task at present. What I have undertaken is to 
produce in you a religious and philosophical conviction ; and I 
should regard myself as departing from my design, if I did not 



MAN OF THE WOULD. 



il 



leave you f[ dl liberty to direct the discussion yourself. I there- 
fore waited for your answer, in the intimate- conviction that 
you would infallibly put questions to me on the points which 
had engaged your mind the most. Your letter proves that I 
was not mistaken; it embraces several questions which clearly 
show to me the present state of your mind; and I think I 
enter fully into your intentions, by considering the following 
question, which is more important than all the others, in the 
commencement. 

"How," say you, "can we reconcile the existence of evil in 
the universe, with the idea of a God essentially good and all- 
powerful V 1 

Yon are aware, sir, that this first question presents the 
greatest of philosophical difficulties; but we may as well 
enter on them now as afterwards ; only be good enough not to 
be astonished if I am obliged to make a long preparatory di- 
gression. To prove that this existence of evil presents nothing 
incompatible with the infinite goodness of God, nor with his 
omnipotence, it is necessary to. have correct ideas, not only 
concerning God and his attributes, but also concerning man 
and the universe. You see that from the very beginning of 
the discussion, we have entered upon subjects, which for three 
thousand years have thrown philosophy into despair, and given 
birth to a crowd of systems, so little conclusive, that the friends 
of truth are still waiting for a satisfactory solution. Still it is 
not the fault of Philosophy, but of philosophers, who have 
wished to sound its depths without being enlightened from the 
torch of religion, and who have not called in the aid of religion, 
until religion itself had lost the true light. However, this is 
not the time to prove this propositiou ; but you will often, in 
the sequel, have occasion to acknowledge the justice of it. 

It is evident that our material world, in its whole and in its 
parts, subsists by the sun which is shining above our heads : 
without its presence, the globe which we inhabit, and all those 



IS 



LETTERS TO A 



which compose the planetary system, would infallibly fall into 
chaos. It is further evident, that all the effects produced by 
the sun, are owing to the heat and light which flow from it. 
Heat and light then are the two principles which cause our 
planet to subsist materially. But there are not only natural 
heat and light in our world, but also spiritual heat and light. 
When a man is moved by an affection, does he not interiorly 
experience heat % When a thought strikes him, is it not an 
internal light to him % This is so true, that in all languages, 
we cannot speak of an affection, without using terms which are 
suitable to heat, nor of a thought, without using terms which 
have relation to light. If we speak of love, we say that it in- 
flames ; of truth, we say that it enlightens. If we wish to de- 
scribe an affection, we say that it is lively or ardent ; or a 
thought, that it is brilliant or luminous. W fiat other conclu- 
sion can be drawn from this, than that the af ction of man is 
a spiritual heat, and his thought a spiritual light ? 

But whence do this heat and light proceed which affect 
us interiorly % Can it be from the sun which is visible to the 
eye of our earthly bodies ? No one would venture to maintain 
this. This sun, because it is visible, is material. Now that 
which is material cannot produce what is spiritual. In vain 
would the materialist make use of the scalpel; he would 
never find in material organs the principles of affection or 
thought. In vain, would he analyse an affection or thought ) 
he would never succeed in discovering in it the least par- 
ticle of imponderous matter. To know whence proceed this 
heat and this light, recourse must be had to analogy, from 
which the following conclusion will be drawn, namely : that 
if natural heat and light come from the natural sun, which 
cannot be denied, spiritual heat and light must proceed from 
a spiritual sun, invisible, like them, to our material eyes. You 
will see hereafter how advantageous the knowledge of this 
simple truth will be, in studying the part of the universe which 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



13 



is inaccessible to the senses of our earthly bodies, and which 
we call the spiritual world. 

We learn also from analogy, that the material world subsists 
from its sun, and, as incontestably, the spiritual world must 
also subsist from its sun 5 and the examination which we are 
now enabled to make upon ourselves goes to confirm the 
analogy. Indeed, if by our bodies we live in the natural world, 
by our spirits we belong to the spiritual world, and as spiritual 
Deing is but a compound of affections and thoughts, it is evi- 
dent that it can only subsist by means of the spiritual centre, 
whence emanate spiritual heat and light, or affections and 
thoughts. Now if we who are yet invested with matter, can- 
not live without this spiritual centre, with much stronger 
reason, beings purely spiritual who constitute the other world 
could not subsist without it. 

Now that we know there exists a spiritual sun, and that the 
invisible part of the universe subsists from this sun, let us 
enquire what can be the nature of such a luminary. All the 
affections of man belong to his will, and all his thoughts to his 
understanding 5 and these two faculties, will and undei standing, 
constitute the life of man \ for it has been said long ago, man 
is man because of willing and thinking; it follows that 
spiritual heat and light, which are in their essence love and 
wisdom, constitute life itself, and as this heat and this light 
emanate from the spiritual sun, it hence results again, that life 
resides in this sun, and that it is this sun which distributes life 
throughout the universe. 

Although life itself resides in this spiritual sun, this sun is 
not life itself, but is only the first recipient of it. Life itself is 
God ; and as real life with man is composed of love and wisdom, 
God, being Life itself, is consequently Love itself, and Wis- 
dom itself. Love is his Esse, his substance; and Wisdom his 
Existere, his manifestation. All his other attributes are con- 
sequences of Love itself and Wisdom itself, as all the faculties 



14 



LETTERS TO A 



of man are consequences of his will, the seat of his affections, 
and of his understanding, the seat of his thoughts. 

If, in this argumentation, I have begun with the investiga- 
tion of man in order to arrive at God, instead of beginning 
with God in order to descend to man, the fault belongs to those 
who have surrounded these subjects with such thick darkness, 
that we are, in this our day, compelled to appeal to the reason 
of man, before we can address his heart. 

Love as it manifests itself in the creature is far from giving 
us a just idea of that Love which is the Essence of the Crea- 
tor. However pure we might conceive human love to be, 
there will always be, between it and the divine Love, the 
inappreciable distance which always exists between the finite 
and the infinite. Nevertheless, in reasoning from what we 
are able to know of true love, we shall see cleared away, suc- 
cessively, the greatest difficulties of religious philosophy. 

It is the essence of love to communicate itself : it must have 
an object to love out of itself - for to love one's self is not 
true love. God, then, who is Love itself, required an object, 
that is to say, creatures whom he might love. Hence the 
creation of the universe. 

I will not here enter into particulars respecting God's work. 
If you would wish to know them, you will find them in one of 
the treatise's of Swedenborg (Angelic Wisdom concerning the 
Divine Love.) I will only say, that to have a correct idea, 
you must throw aside the hypotheses hitherto adopted. That 
of chaos would only throw obscurity on the subject ; that of 
the old theology is not even susceptible of examination. To 
pretend that God created the universe out of nothing, is going 
against the axiom, " out of nothing nothing can be produced 
now God, who is Truth itself, cannot make' self-evident truth 
an untruth. The Divine Omnipotence, as you will see at the 
close of this letter, never opposes itself to the truth. 

The design of God in creating this vast universe, being to 



MAN OF THE WORDD. 



15 



pour out his love upon objects out of himself, and fit to receive 
it, let us first survey the immensity of creation, and seek among 
so many created objects, to discover those which have been 
especially destined to satisfy the ardent love of the Creator, 
by an intimate conjunction with Him. Our eye at first dis- 
covers myriads of sparkling globes, and analogy, supported by 
the knowledge we have of the planetary system, shows us 
millions of other globes, which gravitate round the first ) but 
our understanding also teaches us that bodies passively sub- 
mitted to the invariable laws of gravitation, have none of the 
qualities adapted to fulfil the final end of the Divinity. These 
innumerable suns, and these earths still more innumerable, have 
then only been launched into the immensity of space for the 
use of more noble creatures. If, now, we descend to our 
earth, what do we discover in this multitude of varied objects 
which nature spreads daily before our eyes ? I see there min- 
erals, vegetables, animals, and, at the summit of this scale of 
beings, man. Does not a single examination of this chain 
show us at once, that the mineral kingdom was created for 
the use of the two superior kingdoms % that the vegetable 
kingdom is indispensable to the animal kingdom % and that 
the animals themselves, deprived of the moral sentiment, 
have only been to the Creator means, to the end that the 
only creature capable of reciprocating his love might exist on 
the earths of his immense domain, and there make use of all 
these objects of his divine munificence? It is then for man 
and man alone, that the whole universe has been created. 

After having presented to you God, as Love itself and Wis- 
dom itself; after having shown you that the universe, the 
expansion of his love, has been formed by his wisdom, and 
that all has been created by him alone, I am at length in a 
position to discuss your proposition. You might, however, 
believe that, far from having rendered the solution easier, 1 
have increased the difficulties of it, in representing God as 



18 



LETTERS TO A 



Love itself and Wisdom itself — a definition which seems to 
embrace more than yours, which is, " God essentially good 
for it is always impossible, you think, to deny the existence of 
evil upon this earth, where everything attests the miserable 
state of man, where all nature presents but a permanent 
antagonism between all beings. I am quite of your opinion 
respecting this impossibility ; but you will soon acknowledge 
that I have followed the course traced out for me by the very 
nature of things, and I hope to prove to you that evil proceeds 
not from God, and that, nevertheless, it is a consequence of 
the definition which I have just given. 

Everything proceeded pure from the hands of the Creator. 
It is useless, I conceive, to insist on this proposition, which 
enters completely into our ideas. Love itself acting according 
to the laws of Wisdom, could produce nothing but good. 
From what source then is evil 1 and how could this evil wres- 
tle with Love itself, in which resides Omnipotence? An 
attentive examination of the very nature of love, will remove 
these difficulties, which appear insurmountable. 

If love, as we have acknowledged, is in its essence com- 
municative — if it must have an object out of itself to love — it 
also requires that the object loved shall return love for love. 
To be convinced of this truth, it is only necessary to have once 
loved. Reciprocality being essential to love, God, in creating 
man with a view to shed down his love upon him, must have 
given him all the faculties necessary in order for him to re- 
flect back to his Creator the love which he received from him. 
And observe well, that it was not sufficient that the love of 
man should return to the Creator ; but it was still necessary 
that this love should include in it the condition indispensa- 
ble to all true love ; it was necessary, in a word, that the love 
of man should be in everything worthy of the love of God. 
Now, such a love could not exist with man, except so far aa 
man should have the full and entire liberty to love God or not ; 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



17 



for without liberty there could be no love. How can any one 
believe himself still to be loved, if he discovers that the object 
he cherishes is forced to love him ? If feeble beings who 
possess but a particle of love, disdain to be loved from com- 
pulsion, how could it be supposed that God, who is Love 
itself, had mistaken one of the essential principles of love, by 
constraining man to love him ? With such a supposition, the 
end cf creation has failed : God has worked in vain : his 
essence induced him to create beings capable of loving him, 
and he has formed ouly automatons — instruments purely pas- 
sive, to be moved with wires. Would not this be to degrade, 
and even outrage the majesty of God, and compare him to a 
child playing with puppets 1 

No : God created man free ) and he could not create him 
otherwise, because he is Love itself, and because liberty is an 
essential principle of love. 

It is besides, upon this principle of liberty on the. part of 
man, that all that there is most sacred in the world reposes — 
religion, morality, law. Without this liberty, religious rites 
become superstition — rules of morality become deception — 
and the punishments of law, atrocious injustice. Without this 
liberty, there is no longer, after this life, either happiness 
for the good man, or misery for the wicked ) or God is a 
tyrant, only consulting his caprice in issuing his favors or 
maledictions. 

Created free to love God or not to love him, that is to say, 
free to conform to the laws of divine order, or to transgress 
them, man lived at first conformably to these laws. All was 
then orderly in the universe — nothing disturbed its native 
purity ) everything in its spiritual part was good and true ) 
everything in its material part was good and beautiful 
The other beings of our globe followed the order of their 
nature respectively. Deprived of the principle of liberty, they 
had not the power to disturb the established order. Man 



18 



LETTERS TO A 



alone could re-act against God, and so long as he did not use 
this liberty, the primitive order was maintained ) but from the 
time when he began, by virtue of this liberty, to swerve from 
the laws of order, he introduced by this act a spiritual antag- 
onism. Opposition to good produced evil — opposition to truth 
gave birth to the false or to falsity ) then this spiritual antag- 
onism produced one in the material creation : by degrees, the 
substance of things natural, perverted by evil, from good be- 
came bad, and the form of these things, changed by what 
was false, from beautiful became deformed. 

Do not think, however, that the evil and the false, the bad 
and the deformed, which were introduced into the universe 
in these early times of the creation, were like the evil and the 
false, the bad and the deformed, which we see in it now. The 
evil and the false were then but a slight deviation from the 
good and the true. It was only by an increasing series of 
alterations and deviations, that human nature at length fell 
into those states of fierceness and barbarity, which history 
presents to us. 

You see that the existence of evil is easily reconcilable with 
the existence of a God essentially good, since it is the act of 
man alone, and that it results from human liberty which is an 
essential principle of the love of the creature for his Creator. 
It remains for me to prove to you, that this existence of evil ) can 
also be perfectly reconciled with the idea of an omnipotent God. 

The custom of judging of the attributes of the Divinity by 
those with which royalty is surrounded, has been the cause of 
many errors. When a king, abusing his high station, has 
placed himself above the law, and governed his people accord- 
ing to his caprice, undoing to-day what he did yesterday, he 
has been said to be all-powerful ; and as the greater part of 
despots have pretended to hold their power from God, it has 
been inferred that the divine Omnipotence, being superior to 
human power, could go so far as to do what is absolutely im- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



J9 



possible. From this error proceeded all superstitions ) for 
with, these words, everything is possible with Godj interpreted 
in the sense which I have just described, there are no absurdi- 
ties which may not be admitted. 

If God could do everything, according to the common un- 
derstanding of the divine Omnipotence, he would not be God. 
This will doubtless appear to you a paradox, but it is never- 
theless a truth, and a little reflection will convince you of it. 
Man, subject to error, can perfect his work only on the condi- 
tion of revising and correcting it. If he be a legislator, he 
will only form his code after a long meditation, and having 
promulgated it, his laws will still remain subject to the 
changes which experience shall introduce. But can it be the 
same with God, who is Wisdom itself and Foreknowledge 
itself? When God created the universe, he said, Be it, and 
it was. Yes, by the word of Jehovah was the universe con- 
stituted, with all the laws which govern it ; that is to say, 
with all the laws which could then be manifested, with all 
those which have since been successively manifested, and with 
all those which will be manifested throughout all time. All 
these laws constitute the Divine Order, and are called the 
laws of order. 

You now see that there is no paradox in saying, that if God 
could do everything, according to the common acceptation of 
the divine Omnipotence, he would not be God. If God were 
to change a law of his divine order, would not this be declar- 
ing that he had been mistaken % and what would then become 
of one of his principal attributes, his divine Foreknowledge % 
Oh, let us beware of debasing the Divinity to the rank of a 
capricious tyrant ; let us not compare him even to the best of 
kings ; let us regard him only as a Father, whose love for all 
his children, as much surpasses that of the tenderest of earthly 
fathers, as the infinite surpasses everything finite. 

The liberty cf man being one of the essential laws of divine 



20 



LETTERS TO A 



order, the divine Omnipotence consists in not destroying, but 
maintaining it. The existence of evil then, is perfectly recon- 
cilable with the idea of an all-powerful God. We do not say 
that evil will therefore always exist ; it will disappear from 
the earth, but having entered into the universe by the liberty 
of man, it is necessary that it should be removed by the same 
liberty. Accept, &c. 



LETTER III. 

You say that the theory which I explained to you in my 
second letter is ingenious : you acknowledge the logical con- 
nection of the propositions which served to establish it ; but 
you meet with so many new ideas in these propositions that 
you are confused, and you justly consider that it would be 
precipitate in you to adopt the theory without having maturely 
examined it, and seriously digested it. This is well: you 
enter entirely into my views, and your hesitation gives me 
more pleasure than would an entire acquiescence. I willing- 
ly excuse the ephithet ingenious, which you apply to this 
theory, because you show a disposition to study it. Consider 
it attentively, and you will soon come to acknowledge that it 
is the only one your reason can adopt. Moreover you already 
admit — and that should satisfy me for the present — that it is 
much to be preferred to anything that has been taught up to 
this time, on so grave a subject ; that it removes great philo- 
sophical difficulties, and gives much more elevated and sound 
ideas concerning the Divine Being than any that have been 
hitherto presented. 

You add that you wish to make some objections, ask ex« 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



21 



planationSj and submit reflections to me ; but in 3 our present 
position, not knowing our manner of resolving the other diffi- 
culties of high philosophy, you prefer to wait for a more suitable 
time ) meanwhile, you request me to give you some elucidations 
on the human soul) which may convince you of its immortality. 

You are perfectly right, sir, in wishing to arrive at a cer- 
tainty that your soul is immortal, for this is the principal 
point. If so many men at this day are indifferent as to all 
that concerns religious matters, it is chiefly because they 
have not had anything but mere probabilities presented to 
them respecting their immortal existence, or their state after 
death. Our philosophers and theologians have made the ques- 
tion so intricate, that among men of the world, there is at least 
a half who deny this immortality, if not with their lips, yet 
with their hearts, while the . other half believe it only upon 
simple probabilities. But to believe upon probabilities, when 
everything in this world leads us to indulge our selfish propen- 
sities ) is this quite sufficient to give us a firmer resolution to 
resist evil % Does not everything that passes daily before us 
prove to the contrary 1 But let a man who has hitherto had 
but a vague idea of his immortality, become certain of it, and 
very soon he will not be the same man ; a happy change will 
soon be wrought in him. 

Suppose, that instead of speaking to men in vague terms 
respecting their existence after death, that existence should be 
demonstrated to them, by showing them in what it consists, and 
by answering all the questions which each should honestly 
make on the subject, with a view to acquire a complete con- 
viction ) would not the most salutary of revolutions be the 
result — a revolution far superior to those which have produced 
the most good, since it would be made without commotion ? 
Induced by their new conviction to come out of that religious 
indifference which is the bane of our modern societies, men 
would seek to be instructed in true religious principles ; they 



22 



LETTERS TO A 



would cast far from them all the falsities which arise from 
scepticism and superstition ; they would joyfully adopt a doc- 
trine full of devotedness, full of love. Firmly convinced that 
their present life is but a state preparatory to entering fully 
upon a life which shall never end j and intimately persuaded 
that their state in eternity depends entirely on the short pil- 
grimage which they shall make upon this earth, they would 
live in the peaceful enjoyment of all the blessings which the 
Creator spreads daily and abundantly around them. Instead 
of regarding their fellow men as so many rivals, they would 
look upon them only as brothers ) devotedness would take the 
place of selfishness, and feelings of envy and hatred would 
insensibly disappear, to make room for charity and love. 
Nevertheless, I am far from saying that man would be exempt 
from faults, that he would always live in conformity with 
principles of true doctrine • but at least, man would then learn 
by this doctrine of charity and love, to distinguish good from 
evil, and the true from the false ) he would consequently 
know when he did evil ) and his relapses, by producing in 
him repentance and the desire for renovation, would help to 
make him progress in the way of goodness. 

What man is there then, who would be so inconsistent as 
not to regret having done evil, and not to resolve on doing 
good, if he were fully convinced of the immortality of his 
soul ? What ! I must be intimately convinced that I shall 
live eternally ! My reason would tell me daily that the long- 
est life on this earth, is not, in relation to eternity, so much as 
a grain of sand to the widest desert, or as a drop of water to 
the immensity of the ocean. T should know that my eternal 
existence depends on the manner in which I shall have ful- 
filled my duties towards my country, my fellow citizens, my 
family, and myself. Everything proves that man's conduct 
depends on the principles which he has adopted. See how 
ardently those who believe in this terrestrial life, follow the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



^3 



consequences of their false principles ; and judge by. this 
what it would be, if men were intimately convinced of their 
eternal existence, The certainty of this existence is then the 
most important point for man, and the most certain means (.£ 
leading him to religious principles. 

This certainty, however, is not obtained immediately. Man 
is plunged into such thick darkness on the subject of whatever 
relates to spiritual things, that he can only perceive the light of 
truth in the degree that he removes the clouds, or the falses 
which intercept it. Though there may be little good will and 
perseverance in him, he succeeds in disengaging himself from 
his prejudices* then his conviction is gradually established, 
and afterwards becomes so firm, that every reflection and 
observation on his part concur in confirming him more and 
more. I do not then pretend to convince you at once ; but 
from the favorable disposition you are in, 1 feel certain that 
after a mature examination, you will admit the different propo- 
sitions which I shall submit to you, however strange they 
may seem at first ; and that the whole will result in producing 
a complete conviction of your eternal existence. 

Your desire to be enlightened on this important point in- 
duces me to postpone to another period the developments 
which I wished to give you, in order to complete the question 
relative to the origin of evil ) they will naturally find their 
place when we come to doctrinal subjects, and when I shall 
explain to you the nature of the fall. I must also before com- 
mencing, say that I shall consider as established, the proposi- 
tions which have already been treated of, and that I shall con- 
tinue to support myself by them, so long as you have not 
positively refused to admit them ; for this is a right which I 
hold from the very nature of our argument. 

The design of God, in creating the universe, having been to 
pour out his love upon objects out of himself, and at the same 
time capable of reflecting back this love, I have shown you 



24 



LETTERS TO A 



that if man were not created free, the end of creation has 
failed. I will now add, supporting myself always on the 
essence of God, which is love itself, that if man had not to 
live after his natural death, the end of creation would also 
have failed. Behold, you will say, a solution which I was far 
from expecting. You promised me new arguments, and you 
decide the question after the manner of theologians and phi- 
losophers ; for many of them have supported themselves on 
the goodness of God, to conclude from it that man will live 
after death. 

Be good enough, I pray, to wait a moment. You would cer- 
tainly have a right to exclaim in this way if theologians and 
philosophers, before bringing forward the goodness of God, to 
deduce from it the existence of another life, had given you 
clear and precise ideas of that goodness ) but have they ever 
presented, upon what they call the goodness of the Creator, 
anything but common-place ideas, almost always in manifest 
contradiction to the other attributes which they give to the Di- 
vine Being % What is, indeed, this God of theologians 1 He is a 
being always angry, who has only consented to pardon the hu- 
man race for the disobedience of the first man, on condition that 
his own Son (innocent of this fault,) should suffer, in order to 
repair it, the most frightful torments ) and who, not content with 
this, is only appeased so far as his Son supplicates him for 
pardon, and makes mention continually of his sufferings, and 
the blood he shed for the redemption of men. When they set 
forth the Creator under such gloomy aspects, they certainly 
cannot be permitted to support themselves upon, or to adduce 
his goodness, that they may conclude fiom it that man will 
live after death. And on the other hand, what is the God of 
philosophers ? A being purely metaphysical, of whom they 
cannot form the least idea; consequently he is to them simply 
a compound of abstractions, having a mere word for their sub- 
ject. When the Divinity is thus reduced to a mere word, 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



25 



however imposing this word may be, they cannot be allowed 
to adduce the goodness of such a being in proof of a new ex- 
istence of man. 

It is not thus that the new Christians, or the members of 
the New Jerusalem Church, represent the God of the universe. 
They lay it down as a principle that Love itself is his Esse, 
(being) and that Wisdom itself is his Existere } and that all 
his attributes are consequences of this divine Love, and of this 
divine Wisdom. You will see hereafter — for I should be de- 
parting too far from my subject to demonstrate it now — that 
the divine Love is Substance itself, and the first substance 
{substance-type) whence proceed all substances ; and that the 
divine Wisdom is Form itself, and the form-type, whence all 
forms are derived ) hence the Divinity, far from being what 
is called a metaphysical being, is Being itself — possessing in 
the most elevated degree, what constitutes a real being — 
namely, substance and form. Strong in this principle, the 
members of the New Church draw from it all possible deduc- 
tions, and all, without any exception, come afterwards to 
corroborate and confirm it ; and what further shows, in a 
manner not to be disputed, that this principle is the very 
truth is, that true philosophy and true theology are always 
found to harmonize with it ) also, that the doctrine, all of 
charity and love, which flows from this principle, is in all 
points, conformable to the Biblical Writings, and perfectly 
reconciles all the apparent contradictions which these writings 
contain ; also, that the historical events which have furnished 
the strongest arguments against the divine Providence, be- 
come, on the contrary, evident proofs of the inexhaustible love of 
the Creator for all his creatures. I should be drawn too far from 
my subject, if I now entered into explanations on these dif- 
fent points, which besides, are of a nature not to be treated 
incidentally ; but farther on, I shall have occasion to develope 
them. Now that I have, as I believe, sufficiently answered 



m 



LETTERS TO A 



the objection which I myself anticipated, it will be easy for 
you to comprehend, by the miserable life which man leads 
upon this earth, that the design of the Creator, or the design 
of Love itself, would completely have failed if man's existence 
terminated with his earthly life. This proposition is so self- 
evident that it is useless to insist upon it further. 

Do not think, however, that by this I consider the question 
of the existence of man after his natural death as entirely 
decided. If I had only had this argument to present to you, 
I should not have undertaken to convince you. I have only 
used it to show you what new strength it acquires, when, in- 
stead of considering the divine Being as theologians and phi- 
losophers do, he is represented as being essentially Love itself, 
and above all, when we are well convinced that in creating 
the universe for man, God had no other end than to satisfy 
his inexhaustible love. Nevertheless, this argument would be 
enough to prove to man the existence of a future state, if his 
mind for a long time tossed about by the subtilties of philoso- 
phers, and the errors of theologians, had not come to lose the 
most simple notions relative to his interior being, and the part 
of the universe which is purely spiritual. It is true that philo- 
sophical spiritualists speak to him respecting the immortality 
of his soul, but they give him no information what this soul is, 
for they know nothing about it, and their ideas on this matter 
are far below those of a simple peasant. They speak to him 
of a future life but it would greatly embarrass them to tell 
him in what it consists. Theologians are also silent whenever 
it is a question to define the human soul ) and if they some- 
times endeavor to give an idea of the other life, their descrip- 
tion only serves to frighten children. 

Therefore, as I have told you already, so long as man, to 
convince him of his immortality, shall only have the common- 
place views <7ealt out to him for so many ages, by poets and 
moralists, by philosophers of every shade, and theologians of 



MAN OF THE WORLD* 



27 



every sect, he will remain in that uncertainty which to you has 
become so insupportable ; for it is not by simple probabilities, 
that a conviction can be formed. But if, instead of having 
had represented to him the soul as a breath, as an unknown 
aerial something, man had had clear and precise ideas given 
to him respecting the interior being which animates him, 
which is himself, and which must survive his natural body ; 
if, moreover, instead of the vague ideas which have been 
hitherto presented to him relative to what is commonly called 
the other world, the existence of that world were demonstra- 
ted to him * if he were made to know in what it consists ) if 
the topography, so to speak, of that world were presented to 
him ) if the continual relations which exist between this spir- 
itual world (where he must live eternally), and the natural 
world (where he sojourns for a little while), were shown to 
him in such a way that he could himself daily and hourly verify 
the reality of a great number of these relations — oh then ! you 
must allow that man by means of these knowledges, would 
easily succeed in forming the firm conviction that he will ex- 
ist after laying aside his natural body • say if this conviction 
would not make him a truly religious man — if this belief be- 
come general, would it not effect, without any commotion, the 
most glorious of revolutions ! 

Well, sir, it is thus, and not by common-place ideas that i 
hope to establish in you a solid conviction. Yes, it gives me 
pleasure to repeat, you will ere long admit and acknowledge 
all the truths which I have explained to you. I am certain of 
this, because you are moved by a sincere desire to know the 
truth, and this desire will keep up your attention, and give 
you all the perseverance which is needed. If you had only 
been directed by a vain curiosity, I should have answered 
your questions by a few brief explanations; but I should have 
regarded it as useless to undertake seriously your conversion, 
for my endeavors would have been vain, and my reasonings 



25 



LETTERS TO A 



futile. We can only convince those who desire to be con- 
vinced. 

I will in my next letter begin the exposition of these im- 
portant truths. Accept, &c. 



LETTER IV. 

In your eagerness to see the exposition which I promised 
you in my last letter, there is nothing, I assure you, to 
astonish me; and I am truly ashamed to receive from you 
apologies w T hich ought to come from me, for having, by pre- 
meditation, postponed to the present letter the' commence- 
ment of this exposition. I will not conceal from you, that in 
acting thus, I felt certain of increasing your desire to know 
our ideas respecting the soul of man, and respecting that 
world into which we all go when we leave this earth. In- 
deed, a man must be sunk into the lowest degree of sensual- 
ism, if the noblest faculties of his being remain inactive in the 
presence of such important questions. If, however, there are 
very few persons who interest themselves now-a-days about 
spiritual things, it is not, you may rely, because the general- 
ity of men have fallen into this gross sensualism • but only 
because the wants of natural life, the perplexities of business, 
and the propensity to worldly pleasures divert their minds 
continually from them. But let some event happen which 
may throw back the attention of the man of the world upon 
this grave subject, and you immediately see him willing to 
devote himself to the serious meditations which the subject 
demands. If persons usually keep in this frame of mind but 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



29 



a very short time, it is because the efforts are ,vain which the 
understanding makes to adopt the noblest aspirations of the 
heart \ it is because the understanding; led astray by the lucu- 
brations of philosophers, or the errors of theologians, offers 
nothing satisfactory to the reason ) then, wearied w T ith wan- 
dering in the labyrinths of so many ideas which have no 
ground to rest upon, men hasten to enter again into what they 
very improperly call the realities of life. 

Allow me to make another observation : How can we help 
being astonished to see philosophers always moralizing, and 
theologians always dogmatizing, when it is so evident that the 
writings of both classes — because of the false ground they go 
upon — are themselves the principal causes of the moral and 
religious disorders against which they strongly declaim 1 I 
willingly admit that they are sincere — that their intentions 
are pure, and their labors conscientious — but yet can this ex- 
cuse them, when past and present experience is sufficient to 
show them clearly that they are pursuing a false course % Do 
they not know that for ages their predecessors have moralized 
and dogmatized without meeting with any success ? Do they 
not see that they themselves are moralizing and dogmatizing 
without making men any better % After so many deceptions 
which follow one another continually, can they without being 
chargeable with want of foresight, expect to be more success- 
ful than their predecessors, especially when they continually 
adopt the same errors % But why do they continue to wan- 
der in the same crooked paths in which people have been 
misled so long % Why do they not enter the new way which 
is open to every one who seeks the truth from a pure love of 
truth'* Why is this'? The answer is easy. It is because 
they are like the abbot of Vertot their seat is made. For them 
the truth has no more attractions than it had for this historian. 
Their seat is indeed made. Can it be believed, for example, 

that they are the men to forget all they have learned and 

2* 



30 



LETTERS TO A 



begin their studies anew ? Can it be believed that they have 
self-denial enough to acknowledge that the writings to which 
they owe their reputation are contrary to the truth? If the 
abbot of Vertot, who then had only his indolence to overcome, 
was unable to conquer it, how can they do otherwise than 
yield, who have to struggle against .all the exigencies of self- 
love ? 

This reflection is not out of place here ; it presents on your 
part the following objection which has often been made ; 
" Why do not the celebrated men of the day adopt the princi- 
ples of high religious philosophy which are held in the New 
Jerusalem Church? Is not the silence they maintain on this 
subject a strong presumption that these principles, w r hile they 
seem very brilliant and solid, do not bear the test of a profound 
examination? 5 ' This is an objection which has long been 
brought against us ; but you may now see what this pre- 
sumption amounts to, which I confess may appear very strong 
at first sight. Far from furnishing an argument against our 
principles, this silence, on the contrary, is altogether in their 
favor ; nevertheless, it certainly is prejudicial for a time, to 
the propagation of our doctrines, because we have not always 
an opportunity of making known the true cause of it. There 
is, indeed, a great number of persons simple enough to judge 
men according to their writings, and to believe that those 
who establish themselves as instructors of the people, are 
beings separate from, and superior to the greater part of hu- 
man weaknesses * but experience proves every day that the 
learned more than all other men, are in general governed by 
a passion which produces in them most fatal results. This 
passion is the love of their own intelligence ) it is this which 
even when they know it not, directs them in almost all their 
actions. This constrains them, as it involves their reputation, 
to gay nothing whatever respecting Swedenborg's writings en 
the subject of religion; and this they do, because these wri- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



31 



tings contain true principles, both of philosophy and religion, 
and a complete refutation of the vain systems of philosophers 
and theologians. 

I ask pardon, my' dear sir, for this digression, and I ask it 
also, for those which will follow, because it will often happen 
that I shall make excursions here and there ; but you may 
rest assured that I shall not lose sight of the propositions 
which are to be the subjects of this discussion ; and, after 
any deviations, will always return to them. Your own proposi- 
tion prescribes this course to me. It would be difficult, for 
instance, to make myself well understood by you, if I confined 
myself simply to declaring the preparatory propositions which 
I shall be obliged to employ, and did not stop occasionally 
to dwell upon those w r hich, as they are not familiar to men of 
the world, can only be admitted by them in proportion as 
they perceive them rationally. Hence the necessity of my 
digressing sometimes from the principal subject. Some of 
the truths which I shall develope may excite your surprise, 
as much by their appearance of novelty as by their contrast 
with the ideas prevailing in the world ) but do not let this 
stop you, only give me a little continued attention, and it will 
not be long before they become familiar to you. Besides, 
these truths have not always been strangers on this earth j they 
were known and believed in ancient times, and their disap- 
pearance is only due to the depravity into which the human 
race fell, by the bad use they made of their free will. 

I come at length to the exposition which I promised you. 
It divides itself into two parts : the first comprising the ques- 
tions relating to the soul and its immortality, and the second 
those relating to the spiritual world ) but as these questions 
are connected together, and illustrate each other, I would have 
you to wait until this exposition, which will, no doubt, take 
up several letters, is entirely concluded, before you form a 
definite judgment on the propositions which, at first sight ? 



32 



LETTERS TO A 



may appear strange, or to have need of further develope- 
ments. 

Men are generally agreed in the acknowledgement that 
what lives in man is his soul or spirit ) only the materialists 
affirm that what is called the soul ceases to exist when the 
body can no longer perform its functions, while the spiritual- 
ists pretend that the soul or spirit survives the decomposition 
of the body. I may, then, assume as a principle, that the soul 
or spirit of man is that which lives within him. 

But what is it that lives within man % or what is it, properly 
speaking, that constitutes his living principle, or the esse of 
his life 1 It is evidently his affection or his love, which has 
for its seat the voluntary faculty. However, if there was in 
man only affection or love, without any manifestation, man 
would not exist : to exist really an esse must have a manifes- 
tation. Consequently the affection or love of man manifests 
itself by his thoughts, which has the intellectual faculty for 
its seat. Although esse and existere are inseparable, and only 
make one, since an esse is an esse only so far as it exists, still 
they can be separated in thought ) thus we can say that the 
love or the affection of man is the esse of his life, and that his 
intelligence or thought is the existere, or the manifestation of 
his love and affection. Hence, I have already told you, that 
in God, Love itself is his esse, his substance, and that Wis- 
dom itself is the existere, or the manifestation of his Love. 

If it is evident that man lives, it is also evident that he does 
not live of himself: man does not produce life, but only re- 
ceives it. And whence does he receive it % I answer, from 
God— from God alone — who is life itself. Life is one, as God 
is one. God transmits life throughout the universe, and yet, 
no created object has life in itself; for it would be a continu- 
ity of God, which is impossible. Every one is a recipient of 
life or of God, not by continuity, but by contiguity ; and thus 
it is that life is in everything, according to the nature of the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



object which receives it ; and that nevertheless; no being has 
life in itself. The father does not give life to his children ; 
for to give it to them, it would require him to have it as his 
own, and he is only the recipient of it. From the father pro- 
ceed only germs adapted to become, like himself, recipients 
of the life which emanates from God alone. It is thus that men 
receiving life from God alone, are brothers — not only all those 
who inhabit this earth, no matter what may be their diversity 
of color — but those also who people all the earths throughout 
the immensity of space. They are all brothers, inasmuch as 
they all have but one only real Father, who is the sole God of 
the universe. The learned may dispute as long as they please, 
whether the different races that inhabit our earth have pro- 
ceeded from one man or from many men : their debates are 
of no importance to us. The brotherhood of man is estab- 
lished in our doctrine upon too solid a basis ever to be shaken 
by science. 

I know that for eighteen centuries it has been repeated in 
the Christian world that we are all children of God : I know 
that this proposition is at the head of all the catechisms ) but 
alas ! it is with this truth as it is with the human soul which 
we are now considering. These two truths, because of not 
having been put forward and understood rationally have been 
considered as propositions very good to figure in sermons and 
moral essays ) but too obscure and uncertain to deserve to be 
taken into consideration in the practical affairs of life. Oh ! 
if men were generally convinced that man does not live of 
himself— that he does not receive life from his father — that 
he does not give it to his children — that there is but one only 
Life — that this sole Life is God himself — that God is essen- 
tial Love — that his Love causes him to diffuse life continually 
into all the objects of creation according as every object is 
adapted for its reception — that of all creatures, man alone, by 
virtue of his organization, receives this life in the highest de- 



34 



LETTERS TO 



gree, by not opposing himself either to the entrance of the 
divine Love into his vill, or to the entrance of the divine 
Wisdam into his understanding — if, I say, men were generally 
persuaded of these sublime truths — the " fraternity of men' 1 
would no longer be a vain term ! Far from being weakened, 
the love of the son for the father, and of the father for the 
son, would be increased. The son would regard his father as 
the true representative of God upon the earth ; the father, im- 
pressed with the goodness of the Creator to all his children, 
and with the importance of the functions that are entrusted to 
him, would strive to perform them worthily; and then God, 
being better known by men would be loved by them, as his 
love has so long invited and called upon them to love him. 

By considering in a former letter the nature of man, we 
were led to a knowledge of God : and now, as we have acknow- 
ledged that man receives his life from God alone, the know- 
ledge of God, will be a means of drawing us to the nature 
itself of the soul or spirit of man. But before commencing 
this enquiry, I have to offer some remarks to you on the sub- 
ject of spiritual substance. 

Among modern spiritualists, there are some who willingly 
admit that there are forms in what they call the other world. 
This no doubt arises from having been accustomed from their 
childhood to these forms, the existence of which is acknow- 
ledged by the Greek and Roman mythologists. Now, it is these 
very philosophers who are the most offended when they hear 
mention made of spiritual substances, as if a world composed 
of forms only could be anything but an imaginary world, or 
as if a being without substance and form were not an imaginary 
entity, which in itself is nothing. And observe what strange 
ideas prevail in the present age. Men are not at all shocked 
when such puerile notions are seriously put forth, and yet 
they cry out if a single word is said about spiritual substance. 
It is easy, however, to perceive that there can no more be 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



35 



really any form without substance than substance without 
form. Nothing real can exist without substance and form ; 
for substance and form are two things which may, it is true, 
be separated in thought but not in reality 

When I said to you that far from being merely an ideal 
being, which in itself is nothing, God is Being itself (Esse), 
possesing in the supreme degree what constitutes a real being, 
namely, substance and form * it was saying to you implicitly 
that his divine Wisdom envelopes and contains his divine 
Love j and thus God has really a form which envelopes and 
contains a substance, Love being the true substance and Wis- 
dom the true form. If you now enquire what is the form of 
the Divinity, I will answer, that the universe being an ema- 
nation of the divine Love, or of the first Substance — an ema- 
nation put in order by the divine Wisdom, or First Form 
(Form-Type) this universe must present in the forms of 
objects of which it is composed, images of this First Form, 
and I will add that as the form of man is the most perfect of 
all forms, it becomes evident that God is in the human form. 

God, then, is Very Man. Yes, my dear sir, with all defer- 
ence to the philosophers of all schools, and to theologians of 
all sects * God, the Infinite being, the Jehovah of the Bible, 
the Eternal Father of Christians, the One God in three Attri- 
butes or Essentials /and not in three persons) of the New 
Jerusalem Church, the Creator, Saviour and preserver of the 
universe — this God who is Life itself, and by whom we exist 
and subsist — this God is Very Man. And it is because he 
is the Human Type (Homme-Type), the Perfect Man, that we 
his creatures, we who live and subsist by him, have in his 
image and his likeness the human form. 

This important truth is so different from the ideas of the 
age respecting the Creator, that it will be difficult at first for 
you to admit it. But when you shall have considered it ; 
when in the course of discussion you shall have acknowledged 



86 



LETTERS TO A 



that it is the fundamental basis of true philosophy and true 
theology • when you shall have seen that by it the greatest 
difficulties are removed, and that it provides us with the 
means of carrying our rational investigations into the spiritual 
world, and the internal of man, so far at least as it is possible 
for a finite being to reason on such profound subjects — then 
you will receive it with so much the more joy, because you 
will be convinced that it would be impossible for you without 
it, to form an exact idea of the true God. Although I do not 
pretend to convince you at once that God is Vert Man, I will, 
notwithstanding, offer you some arguments in favor of this 
truth. 

It is, in the first place, absolutely impossible to represent to 
yourself a being without form. Philosophy has invented a 
God without form, in order to explain to itself a God as Crea- 
tor and everywhere present ) but by abstracting space, this 
fiction can be dispensed with. When you shall have accus- 
tomed your mind to make this abstraction, and shall have some 
ideas of the spiritual world, and the relations which exist be- 
tween that world and ours, you will conceive that a God who 
is Very Man, can have created the universe, and be perpetu- 
ally present in all his work. 

A just idea of God is more important than is generally be- 
lieved. How, indeed, can we love God, if it is impossible for 
us to form an idea of him ? That a philosopher may be seized 
with an admiration for the Creator of the universe, when he 
beholds the rising sun, or the face of nature smiling and flour- 
ishing, or the starry vault in a beautiful night, I can easily 
enough conceive. He yields to the emotion of enthusiasm; 
he ceases then to reason concerning the Author of so many 
wonders, for he admires him ) and I am convinced that if he 
endeavored to discover what was the inmost of his thought 
during this momentary rapture, he would acknowledge that 
the Creator was truly to him then, a real Being, and not a purely 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



a? 



metaphysical one — that is to say, deprived of substance 
and form. But if this philosopher should tell me that 
he loves the Creator, I could not conceive it possible. To 
love, there must necessarily be an object; it is also neces- 
sary that this object be really present, or at least present to 
the thought of him who loves; and in this last case it is 
necessary that the presence in thought should be very mani- 
fest. Now the God of philosophers could not be thus present 
to their thought, since he is an incomprehensible Being, of 
whom they cannot, by reasoning, form to themselves any idea 
— and is it not the same with theologians ? Can they form to 
themselves the least idea of their God? I speak, however, 
only of the first Person of their Trinity. It is true that the 
Roman Catholics, in their temples, represent God the Creator 
under a human form, but in their writings and at the head 
of their catechisms, they declare positively that he is a pure 
Spirit, and from the idea they have of spirit, it is plain they 
do not give to him definitively either substance or form. Now 
as the real end of religion is to establish relations between 
God and man, and to lead man, by the knowledge of God, to 
love this God with all his heart, and to love also his fellow 
men because of God, it becomes evident that any religion 
which presents the Creator deprived of substance and form, 
(without which he is no longer conceivable in thought), thus 
takes away from man all means of conceiving of this God 
the Creator and consequently of loving him, and by this shows 
manifestly that it is not the true religion. 

The belief in God-man has, from the most remote time, 
been admitted by the generality of men, in preference to the 
vapory idea of the philosophers. The more you go back into 
antiquity the more you find this belief prevailing. This 
arises from the circumstance that the simple and unsophistica- 
ted man is generally much nearer the truth than the learned 
man who is spoiled by his systems, and inflated by the love 



S3 



LETTERS TO A 



of his own intelligence ) for the former follows the impulses 
of his heart, while the latter gives himself up to the foolish 
conceits of his understanding. The belief, however, in a God- 
man has been charged by philosophers with pride : they 
have said that man had made God after his own image. If 
this assertion were true, we should see the simple minded 
generally adopting the God of the philosophers, and men 
proud of their intelligence, believing in God-man ) but expe- 
rience proves the contrary. Besides this reproach of pride 
cannot apply to the New Jerusalem Church ) for to say that 
God is Very Man, when the principle is established that God 
is Life itself, and that all men derive their life from God, is 
not this implicitly saying, that it is. the human race which is 
conformable to the Type itself of life, to God the Creator of 
all things ? 

Finally, if it be evident that it is absolutely necessary for 
God to be a substance and form, in order to be a real being, 
and also that he may be apprehended by the thought of man, 
and be loved by him, it is also evident that if God were not 
substance and form, the end of creation would have failed ; 
for we have acknowledged that the universe was created 
with a view to man, in order that this creature, the only one 
endowed with liberty, might return to the Creator the love 
which he received from him. 

But is it indispensable that the Divinity should have the 
human form ? May he not have some other ? I have already 
said that the universe, in the forms of the objects which com- 
pose it, should offer images of the first Form [Forme-Type) ; 
and that of all forms, the form of man approaches the nearest 
to perfection. These assertions are proved by the observa- 
tions of science. When we examine the chain of beings, do 
v/e not find that man is the first link, and that all the succeed- 
ing links are no more than successive alterations of the first ? 
You are doubtless acquainted with that series of pictures 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



39 



which presents scarcely a perceptible difference between them, 
when one of them is compared with that which precedes or 
that which follows, and yet the first represents the Apollo of 
Belvidere, and the last a frog. What the painter has done 
for a frog, he could have done for any other animal, whether 
by increasing or diminishing the number of his pictures. The 
type of man, then, is found in every animal, in whatever state 
of degradation it may be ; and it is thus, because every crea- 
ture is an image, more or less imperfect, of the Prototype 
(Type-Createur). This successive degradation of the human 
form in the chain of beings, is sufficient then to resolve the 
question. It would moreover, be absurd, after having recog- 
nised this successive degradation, to suppose that the form of 
God the Creator, was that of any one of the inferior beings of 
this chain, rather than that of the being who constitutes its 
first link, and to whom all the rest are subject. If some 
nations have given an animal or vegetable form to the Divinity, 
this proves the necessity of representing him under a form ; 
and it shows the state of spiritual degradation into which 
those nations had fallen. 

As this great question of God-maft has been incidentally 
treated upon as being necessary to the subject which engages 
our attention, I w T ill not enter here into further developements ; 
but I shall often have occasion to return to it either in an- 
swering objections which it will give rise to in your mind, or 
in treating on several points connected with it. It is important, 
moreover, in order to understand it well, that you should 
accustom yourself to abstract space and time ) and I propose 
to submit to you shortly our ideas on the subject of this ab- 
straction. 

I now return to our discussion relative to the soul or spirit. 
We have seen on the one hand, that God is Life itself ; that 
his Life consists in Love and Wisdom ; that his Love is the 
first Substance, and his Wisdom the first Form (Form-Type); 



40 



LETTERS TO A 



that from the Divine Love, as the first Substance proceed all 
substances, and that from the Divine Wisdom, the first Form, 
proceed all forms; that God has the human Form; that he 
is Very Man, or the Human Type {V Homme- Meme ou VHom- 
me Type) ; and finally that everything in the universe, pre- 
sents an image which more or less approaches to the form of 
the Creator. 

We have seen on the other hand, that the life of man is his 
soul or his spirit ) that this life consists in will and under- 
standing, or in affections and thoughts ; that the human will 
is a recipient of the Divine Love, and that the human under- 
standing is a recipient of the Divine Wisdom. If, now, we 
recollect that man does not live of himself, and that he de- 
rives his life from God alone, who is Life itself, it will only 
be necessary to connect these different propositions, one with 
another, in order to arrive at the following conclusions : 

1st. Life itself, or God, being substance and form, the life of 
man, that is, his soul or spirit, is also substance and form. 

2d. God having the human form, the soul or spirit of man 
has also the human form. 

3d. The Divine Love being the first Substance, all things 
which, in the soul or spirit of man, belong to his will, that is 
to say, all the affections, are spiritual substances. 

4th. The Divine Wisdom being the first Form (Form-Type), 
all things which, in the soul or spirit of man, belong to his 
understanding, that is to say, all his thoughts, are spiritual 
forms. 

And as there cannot be any substance without form, there 
is not a single affection in the soul or spirit of man without at 
the same time a thought which corresponds to it, so that every 
spiritual substance is always clothed with a spiritual form. It 
is thus that everything constituting the soul or spirit of man 
is endowed with a real existence. 

It results, then, from all that precedes, that the soul or spirit 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



41 



of man is a substantial being, having the human form ; or, in 
other words, that the soul or spirit of man is a real being hav- 
ing a spiritual body, endowed with all the organs which con- 
stitute the material body with which it is clothed. Thus the 
spirit alone receives life, and if the material body seems to live, 
it is because the spirit lives in all the parts which constitute 
this body — the spirit is the man ; the material body is but a 
garment with which the Creator has covered it, according to 
the laws of order, that it may perform its functions in the 
natural w r orld 

Thus the human form belongs to the spirit, and the body 
has this form only because it receives it from the spirit. 

These truths, my dear sir, will excite your astonishment ; 
but it will be easy for me forthwith to make you understand, 
that the material body of man can only derive its sensibility 
and form from this spiritual body, whose existence has just 
been established ; and I think it will be sufficient for this, to 
prove to you : 1st, that of itself the material body is insensi- 
ble ; 2d, that of itself it has no form properly its own. 

1st. The material body is of itself insensible. Chemists di- 
vide matter into inorganic and organic. It is evident at once 
that inorganic matter is insensible ) with respect to organic 
matter, M. Dumas has lately shown, in his lectures on chem- 
istry, that of elementary bodies there are not more than ten or 
twelve at most from which general physiology borrows mate- 
rials 3 and that of these ten or twelve bodies there are only 
four, viz., oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, and azote, which consti- 
tute nearly the whole of the composition of living beings. The 
material body of man is, then, of itself insensible, since it is 
only composed of oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, and azote, ele- 
mentary bodies evidently insensible. If, then, it appears sensi- 
ble, it is because each of the innumerable parts which compose 
it is the envelope of the same corresponding part of the spirit- 
ual body, the only body which can be gifted with sensibility 



42 



LETTERS TO A 



2d. The material body has not of itself any form which is prop* 
erly its own. This results from the fact that matter has not, 
of itself^ any particular form. This proposition may seem to 
you paradoxical, for matter always offers itself to our eyes un- 
der a form which seems properly its own 3 but observe, that I 
have said of itself. Life never ceasing for a moment to exist 
in all creation, and this life impressing a form upon all bodies 
according to the present state of their substances, matter pre- 
sents itself, and should always present itself to us, clothed with 
a form which seems properly its own ; consequently, to have 
an idea of what matter can be of itself ', we must recollect what 
mathematicians have done when they have treated of the mo- 
tion of bodies : they have laid it down, as a principle, that a 
body which has received an impulse must always proceed in 
a straight line, and never stop. This proposition is, like ours, 
in manifest opposition to facts : and yet nobody has ever dis- 
puted it, because mathematicians would have replied : Abstract 
for a moment the resistance of the air, and of the friction 
which results from it, and you will see that our proposition is 
not to be disputed. Well I will say to you, in like manner : 
Abstract life for a moment, and you will acknowledge that 
matter cannot of itself have any particular form. The four 
elementary bodies, of which our material body is composed, 
would not have been combined together, so as to present a 
human form, if they did not cover a spiritual body which has 
itself this form. 

This letter is very long ; but I wished not to conclude it, 
without having given you at least some idea of what the soul 
or spirit of man really is. I will give you in my next letter 
the continuation of this exposition. Accept &c. 



MA.N OF THE WORLD. 



43 



LETTER V. 

I presumed rightly, my dear sir that you would press me 
with questions ) but I am far from reproaching you for it, be- 
cause the kind of impatience which you show is easily ex- 
plained, and is not, to speak favorably, anything more than an 
ardent desire to be released from your painful situation. You 
would like to grasp at once the whole of these theories, which 
surprise you by their novelty, and still more by their elevated 
ideas. Lost for a long time in the midst of the dark labyrinth 
of modem philosophy, you have eagerly laid hold of the thread 
which I have presented to you ) but this thread, which should 
guide your reason, as yet consists for you only in the sequence 
of the logical deductions which I present to you : but if it 
should be broken — if the numerous propositions which are yet 
to be examined, and which engage your mind, should not all 
form a logical connection with those which precede — if, in a 
word, there should afterwards be found a want of continuity 
in the whole system — how would you escape from the laby- 
rinth ? Would you not run the risk of being drawn back the 
more into its dark windings, in proportion to the nearness of 
your approach to the half enlightened part which borders on 
its outlet % The flashes of lightning in the midst of night serve 
only to make it afterwards more dark. Here is your fear ; and 
you express it with so much sincerity, that I should hasten to 
satisfy you. No : be well assured you have nothing to fear ; the 
thread will not break ; follow it with confidence and yon will 
come out of your labyrinth. All I ask of you is perseverance, 
and you will find that all the other theories will come in groups 
around those which I have already presented to you, and consti- 
tute in their harmonious whole, the true system of religious 
philosophy. You will see then, that far from dreading the ex- 



4 4 



LETTERS TO A 



animation of historical facts, this philosophy will itself be able 
to urge it ; for all those facts which have furnished to scepti- 
cism its strongest arguments against the divine Providence, 
can, on the contrary, with it, prove very evidently how much 
this Providence is always admirable in all its ends. 

I had at first intended to answer, in this letter, the questions 
which you address to me ; but after having considered that 
the greater part of them will be explained in the course of the 
exposition which I have commenced, it has appeared to me 
more convenient to continue it. As to those for which there 
is not room in it, they will be treated of before we go to 
another subject. 

I shall not resume the course of our discussion, without say- 
ing a few words to you relative to the simultaneous use which 
I have hitherto made of the two expressions Soul and Spirit. 
My only object was to render myself more intelligible, in 
making use at once, both of the word commonly received and 
of that which we ordinarily use ; for we mean more partic- 
ularly by the word Spirit, the man who is disengaged from 
his material covering ; and sometimes even to avoid the mis- 
takes which might result from the different acceptations of 
this word, we make use of the expression man-spirit. Thus 
the man-spirit or spirit being with us the man existing in an 
immaterial world, just as soul is to men of the world the prin- 
ciple which survives the decomposition of the body, I shall not 
any longer use the two expressions simultaneously, but shall 
more particularly make use of that which we are accustomed 
to employ. I return now to the principal subject. 

It results very evidently from all that I have said to you in 
my last letter, that man is not annihilated by that so much 
dreaded event which is called death. 

You have seen, in fact, that he continues to exist, not as a 
breath or vapor without substance, not as a fleeting and im 
palpable shadow^ not as a thought, without an organic subject, 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



not by transmission of one body into another but indeed, 
as a true man, with this same organised spiritual body, from 
which he derived, in the natural world, his sensibility and 
his form, thus preserving all his identity, taking away with 
him all that causes him to be man, and only leaving on 
the earth the external covering by the aid of which he had 
been in communication with our world, and with the ob- 
jects included in it. 'i his is what we call a man-spirit or 
in a word, a spirit. 

Man then does not cease to exist when his material body 
is no longer in a state to perform the uses for which it was 
destined ; he lives, bat on another theatre ; he lives, but with 
a life then much more active, and much more complete than 
that which he had on this earth • for his spiritual body is no 
longer encased in a gross covering, as in this world. 

This being demonstrated — Does man live in the spiritual 
world eternally'? 

This last question must necessarily be settled before we shall 
be able to conclude that man is immortal ; for it is not enough 
to prove that he lives after his natural death; it is necessary still 
to show that his existence beyond the grave will be prolonged 
to eternity. 

You will observe however that at the point where we have 
arrived, the difficulties which the question of the soul's im- 
mortality presented are quite removed. Indeed, that which 
is necessary above all to prove to the men of our age is, that 
they will live after the dissolution of their bodies. Let man be 
convinced of this truth, and if there should still remain with him 
any doubts about the eternity of his spiritual existence, it 
would be easy to have them removed. If, on the other hand, 
very great difficulties are experienced in convincing him that 
he will live after death, it is because being deprived of the 
most important spiritual truths, he has generally habituated 
himself to reason only from the illusions of his senses. He is 
3 



46 



LETTERS TO A 



accustomed only to admit with entire conviction, what he 
sees with the eyes of his body ; now, he sees every day the 
scythe of death cutting down men indiscriminately, and he has 
never seen one of his victims reappear. He does not know 
that if everything in the material world presents to us this 
picture of the successive decomposition of beings, it is because 
matter of itself is dead, and only receives from the spiritual 
world the life with which it seems to be animated. He is 
thence induced to believe that man, like all other beings 
which dwell with him on the earth, is annihilated by natural 
death. It is then very difficult when man has fallen into such 
a state, to convince him with only the common views of phi- 
losophy, or even with the arguments of the old theology, that 
he is excepted from the general law, and that he is destined 
by his Creator to live eternally. But when it is proved to him 
that the soul is a substantial being, having the human form — 
when he has understood that man after his natural death, lives 
in a spiritual body, that is to say, in a body not subjected to 
the laws of matter — when he knows that he dwells with this 
body in a world where all must be life, since matter does not 
exist there — then he can no longer experience any great diffi- 
culties in admitting that man, when become a spirit, lives 
eternally in a spiritual world. 

To demonstrate to you the eternity of this spiritual existence, 
I will satisfy myself in giving you only two proofs : one of 
them I will base on the Essence itself of God, or on his divine 
Love; the other shall be founded on his divine Wisdom in 
the work of Creation. The first of these proofs, which might 
alone establish a complete conviction, is that which I derive 
from the Essence itself of God. You have most readily ac- 
knowledged that God is in his Essence Love itself. This 
definition has pleased you, because it satisfied both your heart 
and your reason : it is besides, so conformable to the sound 
idea which ought to be formed of God, that no one, I believe. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



4 7 



would venture openly to dispute it. If then, God in his Es- 
sence is Love itself, he must necessarily be constant in his 
love, since constancy is one of the essential qualities of love. 
Now, would not God give the most manifest proofs of incon- 
stancy if, after creating human beings that he might love them, 
and himself be loved by them in return, he should annihilate 
them ? Let us conclude then, that the spirit that has respond- 
ed to the love of the Creator while living in the material 
body, will live eternally in the spiritual world. When I have 
shown you in what consists the existence of the spirit, you 
will see that God, who never infringes the immutable laws of 
his divine order, permits him also to subsist eternally who has 
rejected his love. 

My second proof, founded upon the Wisdom of God in the 
Creation, requires that I should previously give you some ideas 
upon the nature of the beings that are designated in general by 
the name of Angels. If I am obliged to speak to you of An- 
gels, on the subject of the immortality of the soul, before 
showing you in what that which is called Heaven consists, it is 
because all great questions have numerous points of contact ; 
and it would be impossible thoroughly to treat one without 
approaching others. Besides, it must be thus in a true sys- 
tem ) for in order that its different parts.may form an harmo- 
nious whole they should be connected with each other. 

Those who believe in the existence of angels, generally think 
that they are beings created before man and of a superior na- 
ture. This opinion, besides resting upon no foundation, is an 
error. All intelligent beings who exist in the immaterial world, 
whatsoever other denomination is given to them, are men, 
and all have lived upon earths before living in the imma- 
terial world. These are two truths which it will be easy to 
prove. 

First : All tht Angels are men. To admit this proposition as 
an incontestable truth, it is enough to know what we are ta 



-13 



LETTERS TO A 



understand by man. God being Very Man, and the human- 
type (Vhomme-type) the name of man must belong to every crea- 
ture who is formed in the image or according to the likeness of 
God, that is to say, who is fit to receive freely his love and 
wisdom. Man then is every being endowed with a will fit to 
receive freely the divine love, and with an understanding fit to 
receive freely the divine wisdom. And as liberty is an inhe- 
rent quality of man, it results thence that every man by virtue 
of his free will appropriates or rejects, in different degrees, this 
love and this wisdom, which are always in the effort to enter 
into him. From this it is that the difference proceeds which is 
observed between all men, and which causes each to be him- 
self, and impossible to be confounded with another. But what- 
soever may be the diversity which exists between intelligent 
beings, whether Hottentots, Laplanders, Chinese, or Europeans : 
whether black, copper-colored, or white ) whether they inhabit 
this earth or the planets of our solar system, or even those of 
other systems ) in a word, whatsoever may be the character, 
stature, and color of a being, provided he has a cerebellum and 
cerebrum, formed in such a manner as to be able to receive 
the divine love and the divine wisdom, this being is a man. 

Now, according to this definition of man, a definition which 
is but a consequence of principles already explained, you see 
that there cannot exist intermediate beings between God and 
man, and that thus angels are, properly speaking, men. If, how- 
ever, from a recollection of instruction received in your child- 
hood, there remains yet a propensity to consider angels as 
beings of a nature superior to man, I would suggest to you, that 
in these same instructions you learned also that God had created 
man in his image, and according to his likeness. *fVow if an 
angel, who is also a creature of God, was of a nature superior 
to that of man, pray, tell me, what could that nature be ? Use 
all the efforts of your imagination, and see if it would be possi- 
ble to conceive of a nature superior to that which is in the image 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



49 



and according to the likeness of God. Those who held this 
language to you contradicted themselves. No, I repeat it, there 
are not and there cannot be beings intermediate between God 
and men, or of a nature superior to that of man, and this, be- 
cause God is Very Man ) and besides, all beings to whom are 
given the name of angels, have the human form, because the 
first form [Form-Type) is the human form. All angels then 
are men. 

Second : All Angels have lived upon earths before living in 
the immaterial world. It is very evident that it is only in a pre- 
paratory world, that is to say, in the natural world, that intelii 
gent creatures are enabled to use free will, or choose between 
good and evil, between the true and the false. If the inhabitants 
of heaven could become guilty or rebellious, none would be 
certain of remaining there, whence heaven would be no longer 
heaven, for the single idea of the possibility of being driven 
thence would destroy that happiness which makes heaven to be 
what it is. You will see presently when we treat upon the 
mode of the existence of Spirits, that there is no choice to 
make in the spiritual World, because choice has been made in 
the natural world 3 you will see that every one then enjoys, not 
free will, but liberty , which in the good consists in doing good 
freely, without fearing evil, and in the wicked, in freely doing 
evil without experiencing remorse ; so that the liberty of one 
is true liberty, with all the enjoyments wdiich result from it, 
and that of the other genuine slavery, the slavery of evil, 
with all the torments which it produces. If then, there is no 
enjoyment of free will but in the natural world, from all neces- 
sity it results that angels have first lived upon earths, or 
that they have been created without being endowed with free 
will. Now, in this second hypothesis, far from being superior 
to man, the angels would be much inferior to him, for they 
would be no more than automatons, destitute of the principle 
of reciprocality, and thence unworthy of the love of God. Id 



50 



LETTERS TO A 



fact, from the principles which have been set forth in my sec- 
ond letter, a being created perfect would be but an instrument 
purely passive, or a machine. It thence evidently results that 
angels are men, who during their life in the natural world 
have been rendered worthy to receive afterwards the divine 
Love and the divine Wisdom in a very high degree. 

Thus is confirmed anew this proposition, already advanced, 
that man was the sole end of Creation ; for since there are no 
intermediate beings between God and man, it results necessa- 
rily that all that exists, as well in the natural as in the spirit- 
ual world, has been created with a view to man, who is the- 
only being capable, by his constitution, of returning to his Cre- 
ator the love which he receives from him. The spiritual or 
immaterial universe being thus found to be peopled only with 
men who have lived originally upon the earths, if these men 
who are spirits or angels are not to live eternally, it follows 
either that they would successively cease to exist, as in our 
world, or that they would cease to exist all at once. There are 
no other suppositions to make; now these suppositions are 
both inadmissible. 

To suppose the successive ceasing of the inhabitants of the 
spiritual world, to make way for others, would be to suppose 
that the immaterial world might be no longer capable of con- 
taining all the beings who are daily leaving the earths ) this 
would be as a consequence to assimilate the spiritual to the- 
material, or to compare life to death ) for it is life which con- 
stitutes the spiritual world, and you know that matter of itself 
is dead or deprived of life ; it would be, in a word, to materi- 
alize affection and thought. Now, if affection and thought 
can be exempt from the laws of space even in this world (of 
which you may easily convince yourself, since your affection 
and thought know no distance), how could it be supposed that 
they would be subjected to these laws when man is no longer 
imprisoned in matter ? The first hypothesis is then- inadmissible. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



51 



To suppose that the inhabitants of the spiritual world should 
cease to exist at one time would be supposing that that world 
might be annihilated, for what w^ould a spiritual world be 
totally deprived of intelligent beings'? And as the material 
world is of itself dead, and has life only from the spiritual 
world, this would be to suppose the annihilation of all that has 
been created. Now, if the vrhole creation were annihilated, 
God who is Love itself, could no longer diffuse his love, the 
essence of which is to be communicative ) and his divine Wis- 
dom w r hich is Foresight itself, w T ould be imperfect, since in cre- 
ating the universe that the divine Love might might be satis- 
fied, it would not have been able to accomplish this end. 
Such a supposition, which would accuse the divine Wisdom 
of want of foresight, is then likewise inadmissible Thence 
results the second proof of the eternity of the spirit in the im- 
material world. 

Now let us recapitulate what has been said on the immor- 
tality of man. I have shown you in my last letter, that man 
does not cease to exist at tne time which is very improperly 
called death ; that he continues to live in the spiritual world, 
wdth a body organized like the one he had in the natural world 
— that this body, of a nature wholly spiritual, is not given to 
him at the time of his passage from one world into another — 
that he has had this spiritual body in the natural world — that 
it is truly by it that he experienced sensations in this world, 
and that it has had the human form, his material body having 
been but a simple covering, with which the Creator had invested 
him that he might perform his functions in the natural world. 
Lastly, in this letter, to establish the certainty that the spirit 
or the man divested of his material covering, must live eternally 
in the spiritual world, I have demonstrated that if he should 
cease to exist, God, who is love itself, would contravene one of 
the essential conditions of love, by exhibiting himself as incon- 
stant, which cannot for a moment be supposed 3 and moreover, 



52 



LETTERS TO A 



that the end of creation would not be attained, which could not 
be admitted, without accusing the divine Wisdom of want of 
foresight. From all this results rationally the complete proof 
of the immortality of the soul. 

Do not believe, however, that I rest upon tne reasonings which 
I have presented to you. Strange would be my illusion, if I 
thought I had established in you a firm conviction, because 1 
had proved to you, by a logical train of arguments, that you 
were to live eternally. No, my dear sir, should you even say : 
I am altogether convinced, I could not believe it ) not that I 
would doubt the sincerity of your avowal, but because in the 
actual state of your present ideas, a firm convictiou on such a 
subject could not be formed but by a long series of medita- 
tions. I will grant you then all the time necessary, and will 
furnish you. in each of my letters, means for meditating on 
the eternity of your existence \ for of all theories which are 
yet to be examined, there is not one which does not bring new 
confirmative proofs of this important truth. 

As that which is the most difficult to admit in this discus- 
sion, is the existence of the spirit in the human form, with a 
spiritual organised body, I cannot' too much insist upon this 
point. To the proofs then already given, I shall add some 
others drawn from the observation of certain facts which may 
be easily verified. These new proofs will be so much the 
more to your taste, as it is generally required, at this day, that 
theories should be confirmed by facts. 

Towards the conclusion of my last letter, I proved to you 
that the material body of man is of itself insensible, and has no 
form properly its own. These two truths, drawn from modern 
science, already evidently confirm the existence, with man, 
of a spiritual organized body ; for if the material body has of 
itself neither sensibility nor form, it is necessary that both of 
these should be derived from the spiritual body. It remains 
now to confirm, by the observation of facts, that this spiritual 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



53 



body has the same organization as the material body which 
covers it. 

When a man receives a wound, he suffers. Why does he 
suffer % Because the separation of continuity which exists m 
the wounded part disturbs the organization of his body. But 
what is it that suffers in him % is it matter 1 No : since it is 
of itself insensible. Is it his soul % Yes, since his soul, or his 
spirit, that is, his life, is the man himself. Now, how could 
you, from the ideas of philosophers, conceive that the soul, 
the spirit, or the life, could suffer from an act purely material % 
Hitherto it has been absolutely impossible to account for it ) in 
vain explanations have been sought 5 the physiologists in their 
researches have not. been more fortunate than the psycholo- 
gists * neither the one nor the other have as yet presented 
anything satisfactory, But if recourse is had to our theories, 
and a spiritual body is admitted, organised like the material 
body, all is easily explained. We invite you to the test. 

Life is composed of affections and thoughts ; the affections 
being spiritual substances, and the thoughts spiritual forms, 
the life peculiar to every being is always organised, by means 
of these substances and forms, by reason of the affections and 
thoughts or instincts of which this being has been created 
susceptible. Now man having been created such that he 
could receive the divine love in his will and the divine wis- 
dom in his understanding, it results from this, that in him life 
is in a complete state : that it is an image of Life itself or of 
God ) and that consequently it is, in the whole, a substance 
having the form of God, that is to say, the human. Observe 
at the same time, that man cannot act in the material world 
but by an intermediation of matter 3 that it is for this reason 
that all the parts of his spiritual body have been covered with 
material substances which constitute his natural body, and it 
will be easy to comprehend why man suffers when his mate- 
rial body receives a wound. 



^4 



LETTERS TO A 



Indeed, when the material body is in its integrity, the spirit- 
ual body is able to act freely according to internal impulses , 
but if the material body is hurt, whether by contusion, by in- 
cision, or in any other manner, the action of the spiritual body 
not being able to put itself forth freely, there is pain, suffer- 
ing. If, for example, there is separation of continuity in a 
part of the material body, there is not, in truth, on that ac- 
count separation of continuity in the corresponding part of the 
spiritual body, but this body being no longer able to act in our 
world by the injured part of the material body, there is pain 
so much the more acute, so much the more severe, as the dis- 
turbance is great ; and this pain may even affect the whole 
organization of the spiritual body, if the injury is of a nature 
to disturb its general action. If, moreover, the injured part 
is an organ indispensable to the general action of the spiritual 
body, such as the heart, for example, or such as the lungs, the 
material body, not being of any further use to the spiritual 
body for acting in our world, it is impossible that the two 
bodies should remain longer united. Then the separation 
takes place ; the material body being then nothing more than 
a corpse, and the spiritual body disengaged from the bonds 
which confined it in the natural world, at once exists without 
the need of translation, in the spiritual world. 

Let me support what has been said by a phenomenon 
which has often been produced. You have no doubt conversed 
with soldiers who have suffered amputation of their limbs : our 
late wars have unhappily but too much increased their num- 
ber. Have you not often heard these brave men complain of 
severe pains which they experienced in the heel or the toe, 
though their leg has been left many years since in the field of 
Austerlitz or the plains of Leipsic ? Has it not sometimes hap- 
pened to you to see them even — so strong is the impression — 
suddenly carry the hand to the part affected, with the intention 
of compressing there the pain, and have you not then per- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



55 



ceived their disappointment when, for the hundredth time 
perhaps, they seized nothing but a piece of insensible wood 1 
If you have never witnessed such facts, ask the first person 
who has suffered the loss of a limb, and he will confirm you 
in the reality of it. If afterwards, struck with this extraordi- 
nary phenomenon, you would desire to know the cause, would 
you inquire of science ? You would receive no satisfactory 
answer. Should you be more fortunate in consulting philoso- 
phy ? Philosophy would be dumb. But have recourse to the 
principles which I have explained, and you will easily obtain 
an explanation which will satisfy your reason. 

The amputation of a leg or of any other member of the ma- 
terial body, cannot deprive the spiritual body of this member. 
The person who has lost a limb preserves then his spiritual 
body in its integrity ; if the spiritual limb is not visible to the 
eyes of our material body, it is because the material is not ca- 
pable of seeing anything but what is material. It is not, it is 
true, the material eye which sees ; it is the spiritual eye ; but 
as in general the spiritual eye cannot see in our world but by 
the medium of the material covering, for this reason I say 
that the material can see nothing but what is material. Now, 
since the spiritual leg of the person amputated always exists, 
though invisible to the eyes of our body, it is not astonishing 
that this leg, or even its extremity, should be affected with a 
pain of which the amputated person will experience the sen- 
sation ) it is the spiritual body which suffers in him, and not 
the material. Besides, as there are circumstances where, with, 
those who enjoy their material limbs, a pain in the superior 
parts extends even to the heel or the toe, and becomes even 
more severe in these extreme parts, it may clearly be seen 
that it should be the same in like circumstances, though the 
material leg no longer exists. 

According to the same principle of the integrity of the spir- 
itual body, notwithstanding the mutilation of the material 



56 



LETTERS TO A 



body, the man who has been deprived of his material eyes, 
preserves his spiritual eyes entire, he is only blind as to that 
which concerns the objects of this world. He does not see 
these objects, because the spiritual eye, as I have told you, 
cannot see in the material world but by the medium of the 
material organ of vision, and this organ failing, the phenome- 
non of natural vision ceases immediately. In like manner, 
the deaf man does not hear, because the spiritual ear cannot 
perceive the sounds of the natural world but by the intermedi- 
ation of the material organ of hearing, and if this organ is 
hurt, deafness ensues : but the deaf man preserves entire the 
spiritual organ of hearing. 

If during sleep the blind man has had a dream and retains 
the recollection of his dream, he then acknowledges that he 
saw objects which were presented to him as distinctly as he 
saw natural objects when he had the use of his eyes. The 
deaf man acknowledges also, when he retains the recollection 
of his dream, that he then perceived sounds as distinctly as he 
perceived natural sounds before his state of deafness. How 
are we to explain these facts 1 It will be said without doubt 
that they are the effects of the imagination 3 but then what is 
this imagination % It would be very difficult to answer the ques- 
tion. The imagination is often suggested as a reason : it is a 
word which the philosophy of the day highly esteems, for it 
serves to withdraw it from embarrassments when it is pushed 
to its last entrenchments ; but it is very evident that to attri- 
bute such facts to the imagination, would be evading the ques- 
tion, and not resolving it. To explain now to you the theory 
of dreams, would be digressing too far from my subject; we 
will examine it together hereafter ; I will only say that gene- 
rally in dreams, it is the spiritual body of man which is alone 
active, and this is sufficient to -give an explanation of the facts 
respecting the sight of the blind and hearing of the deaf. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



57 



The blind man sees then with his spiritual eyes ; and the deaf 
man hears with his spiritual ears. 

It would be easy to multiply confirmative proofs of the ex- 
istence in man of an organized spiritual body, by explaining 
the extraordinary facts which some new branches of science 
reveal ; but I should be drawn into too long a digression, for 
these new branches of science being yet for the most part 
devoid of theories, and presenting, to say the least, as many 
inconveniences as disadvantages, I could not speak of them 
without specifically pointing them out, which would cause 
you to lose sight of the exposition which now engages our at- 
tention. Nevertheless, wdien you become acquainted with 
the order of the spiritual world, and the mode of existence of 
its inhabitants, you will always find me disposed to reply to 
the questions which you may think proper to ask on the sub- 
ject of these new discoveries, and I will take care to put you 
on your guard against the dangers which they may present, 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER VI. 

Although you have acknowledged the force and stability of 
the proofs which I have given you concerning the immortality 
of the soul, yet I could not hope to establish an unshaken con- 
viction on this point, if there were not in reserve some other 
means of strengthening that which you confess begins to be 
formed within you. Of what use would it have been to have 
proved to you that your material body is only an envelope, 
and to have shown you that this envelope, though necessary 
to your present existence, is not indispensable to constitute the 



58 



LETTERS TO A 



real life, of which the life of this world is but thfc first link '? 
Of what use would it have been to have convinced you that 
there exists in you a spiritual body — that this body is ab- 
solutely organized like your body of flesh, and that it is as in- 
destructible as everything else which is of a spiritual nature 1 
Of what use would these truths be, if I were not to make you 
acquainted with the spiritual world, of which it is yet im- 
possible for you to form an idea % — if I were not to place be- 
fore your eyes this new theatre upon which your man-spirit 
must exercise to all eternity the functions of his immaterial 
nature ? Without a knowledge of that world, how could you 
combat in yourself the objections of every kind which would 
come in crowds to assail your first conviction 1 One day you 
w r ould believe, the next deny. 

Far from having brought relief to your position, I should 
only have rendered it the more intolerable, by exciting in you 
a desire to believe, without presenting to you all that is neces- 
sary to establish and confirm your faith. You would have 
had a right to say to me : " This breath, or this vapory being 
of philosophers and theologians, I thought little about, since it 
is impossible to form h, clear idea of it 3 I thought no more 
about angels, whom *hey represent in human form, for the 
wings which thev give to them show plainly enough that they 
are bn'c pure fictions. However, I might have been able in 
some degree by an effort of the imagination, to represent to 
myself, in the midst of the immensity of the etherial regions, 
«ouls wandering here and there, and angels flapping or poising 
their wings to support their bodies. But your men-spirits, 
and your angels in a perfect human form, what idea can I 
form of their existence ? Philosophers and theologians place 
but little stress on their lucubrations relative to the nature of 
the soul; almost all confess that they are far from relying 
with certainty upon what they advance, while you on the 
contrary, appear to have not the least doubt of your assertions 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



Hasten, then, fo draw me from this position, or else, while 
wishing to relieve me of my doubts, you will but have in- 
creased them." 

With great propriety would you thus address me, if I should 
delay satisfying the desire you must have to know something 
of this spiritual world : therefore I am anxious to give you 
some ideas which will enable you at once to comprehend the 
the whole. You will see then that the spirit, disengaged from 
the matter with which it is here covered, possesses all that 
which is necessary for its existence ; and that the life which 
it enjoys is much more complete than that which it had upon 
this earth. 

It would, without doubt, be easier to present to you these 
views, if you were acquainted with our theory of degrees, and 
our manner of regarding space and time • but in your present 
state, it is necessary to proceed at once to the subject ) I 
shall 5 therefore, enter upon it without any preliminar}^ re- 
marks. 

The knowledge which we have of the man-spirit will con- 
duct us directly to that of the spiritual world. In this, it will 
be sufficient to follow the law of analogy, for there must exist, 
between the spiritual and the material worlds, relations anal- 
ogous to those which exist between the spirit and the material 
body. Now if the spirit is a real man, if the form of the ma- 
terial body belongs to the spirit, and these are two truths which 
we have acknowledged, we must thence conclude that the 
spiritual world is a real world, and that the form of the mate- 
rial world belongs to the spiritual world. 

Indeed, from this alone, that you have acknowledged the 
truths which concern the man-spirit, you are forced to admit 
the correlative truths which apply to the spiritual world. If, 
as the discoveries of modern science prove, the matter of 
which our body is composed, is of itself insensible, and has 
of itself no particular form, with much stronger reason must 



60 



LETTERS TO A 



it be the same with inorganic matter. If the material body 
does not live of itself, how can the other objects of nature have 
existence of themselves ; and how can nature, in the complex, 
exist of itself ? If the matter which composes our bodies has 
not form of itself, how can that which constitutes the other 
bodies of nature, of itself present to us the indefinite variety 
of forms which charm our sight, and how can the whole of 
nature have a form ? All the objects which exist in our world 
receive, then, their form from objects similar, or properly cor- 
responding, which are in the spiritual world. I say correspond- 
ingj for though the things in the spiritual world appear like 
those which are in ours, it is to be observed, however, that they 
differ from them in this, that they have in them life, because 
they exist and subsist from the spiritual sun, in the interior of 
which resides the Divinity ) while the things of the natural 
world, existing and subsisting from the material sun, have no 
life in them, but what they receive by the intermediation of 
the spiritual world. 

Since, according to this, there cannot be in our world a sin- 
gle object which is not the correspondent of an object existing 
in the spiritual world, in reality, that is to say, in substance 
and form, the strict consequence which we must thence draw 
is, that there is in that world, as in ours, stars which appear 
fixed in an azure vault, a horizon with its zenith, atmos- 
pheres with their meteors, countries watered by rivers, seas 
confined to their limits by coasts, the three kingdoms with 
all that constitutes them, and the indefinite variety of all the 
objects of art, which result from the labors of man. Thus, 
my dear sir, if until this moment, as I have supposed at the 
commencement of this letter, you had not been able to form 
in yourself an idea of the existence of men-spirits; if you had 
not known where to place these spiritual bodies, organized 
like our material bodies, you see now, that by means of these 
objects, which are all of an immaterial nature, men-spirits 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



61 



enjoy a real existence, which it is no longer impossible to 
comprehend. You see, also, that far from being lost in a va- 
pory immensity, they exist upon a solid earth, and are sur- 
rounded with real objects, for the earth upon which they 
walk, the houses which they inhabit, the air which they 
breathe, and all the objects in general which are before their 
eyes, or which they touch, are then for them as real as our 
earth, our habitations, the air, and all that which surrounds us 
is now real for us. 

You will, without doubt, be as much astonished in learning 
these things, as you were when I announced to you that your 
soul or your spirit is a real man, having a spiritual organiza- 
tion, like that of your terrestrial body. Nevertheless, the first 
truth must have served to prepare you for the second; for 
these are, as I have told you, two correlative truths, and the 
admission of the one, necessarily draws after it that of the 
other. Your astonishment would be still greater, if I should 
at once make you acquainted with this spiritual world in all 
its details ; but before presenting you with the details, I must 
endeavor to convince you of the reality of the whole. 

As you read that which precedes, your mind, it seems to 
me, will be greatly excited to know where this spiritual world 
can be situated. This desire appears to me so much the 
more natural on your part, as from your quality as a man of 
the world, you cannot yet think of spiritual things, but from 
ideas of space and time. Yet the spiritual world, from its 
very nature, is entirely freed from the trammels of space and 
time ) for space and time are accidents inherent in matter, and 
can only exist in reality in the natural world. I will return 
soon to these truths, which I now merely announce, for it is im- 
portant that I should present to you at once, some general con- 
siderations upon the relations which exist between God, the 
spiritual world, and the natural world. This subject being of 
an abstract nature, T claim for a moment all your attention. 



LETTERS TO A 



When you do a work you are directed by a motive, and you 
have an object in view. This object is ; philosophically 
speaking, the end ; the motive which directs you, is the cause ; 
the work which you do is the effect. These are three things 
which are connected together by relations which it is impor- 
tant well to determine. 

With very little reflection upon that which passes in your 
mind when you act, you will easily see the difference which 
exists between the end and the cause, in acknowledging that 
the end or the aim, is an affection which resides in your will, 
whilst the cause is a thought which has for its seat your un- 
derstanding. But that you may be better able to comprehend 
this difference, and follow this discussion without any effort, 
I shall support what I have said by an example. 

When a sculptor wishes to make a statue from a block of 
marble, he is evidently moved to satisfy an affection, and di- 
rected afterwards by a thought. His affection is either to pro- 
vide for his natural wants, or to acquire fame. This first 
moving principle of the sculptor is the end or aim. After- 
wards he has recourse to his intellectual faculties to create a 
form ; the thought which conceives the form to give to the 
marble is the cause^ for it is this thought which will direct the 
hand of the sculptor in the execution of his work. Finally, 
the manifestation of this form by the chisel, that is to say, the 
statue itself, is the effect. 

It thence results that the end. the cause, and effect, are not 
in relations which precede by continuity, whether from the 
simple to the compound, or from the compound to the simple, 
as are for the most part those which exist between things of 
the same nature. Their relations do not consist in fact either 
in increase or decrease of the same thing, as the relation of 
light to heavy, which is only an increment of densit)', nor as 
that of heat to cold which is but a decrement of caloric. Bat 
if we examine attentively the nature of the end, of the cause 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



63 



and of the effect, we see that these three things are placed 
one above the other, in degrees entirely distinct or separate 
from one another, so that the relations which exist between 
them are like those of the anterior to the posterior, or like 
those of the superior to the inferior. 

It is, indeed, evident that the end or design is anterior and 
superior to the cause ; the end is anterior to the cause ; for the 
sculptor has been moved by the love of riches or of glory, be 
side having had recourse to his intellectual faculties to create 
the form of the statue : the end is superior to the cause ; for 
the love or affection of the sculptor is above his thought, since 
it is this love or this affection which has determined his 
thought, and which does not cease to sustain it. Suppose this 
love in the sculptor should cease, would not his thought be 
immediately directed to some other object ? 

It is in like manner evident, that the cause is anterior and 
superior to the effect ; for the thought of the sculptor had con- 
ceived the form of the statue, or of every part of the statue, be- 
fore his hand applied the chisel to it ; the cause is superior 
to the effect ; for the thought of the sculptor is above the 
statue, since it is this thought which determines the form of 
the statue. If, before having finished his work, the sculptor 
rejected his thought, would not the form of the statue have 
remained unfinished % 

Not to confound these relations between things which are 
of an absolutely different nature with the relations which re- 
sult from increments or decrements of the same thing, we give 
to the first the name of discrete degrees, and to the others the 
name of continuous degrees. So there are three discrete degrees 
— the end forms the first degree, the cause is the second, and 
the effect is the third or last. Continuous degrees are in num- 
ber indefinite. The theory of continuous degrees is not diffi- 
cult to comprehend, because these degrees, presenting only 
differences in more or less, can be easily studied. But it U 



LETTERS TO A 



not so with the discrete degrees : the theory of these, also ; which 
constitutes a real science, is, at this day, entirely obliterated , 
and it is the loss of this knowledge which produces all the 
vague lucubrations of philosophy, when it is engaged in the 
considerations of ends, causes and effects. As the nature of 
the questions we treat of will compel me often to have recourse 
to this theory, I propose to develope to you successively its 
principles. 

The end, the cause, and the effect being three things of a 
nature absolutely different, but united by relations of anteri- 
ority and superiority, it concerns us now to see what results 
from these relations. 

Be it observed, in the first place, that ends and causes can 
only be comprehended so far as they are manifested in effects. 
Without the acts which they produce, they would be as if they 
had no existence ) but, by means of their manifestation, they 
are fixed in effects, repose in them as upon their basis, and 
remain there so long as the effects subsist. Thus, so long as the 
statue subsists, the thought of the sculptor will remain in this 
statue, the form of which is nothing else than this thought defi- 
nitely arrested and fixed ) but, though it may be thus arrested 
and fixed in such a manner as to strike the eyes and minds of 
those who contemplate the statue, it is nevertheless certain 
that this thought does not cease to be in the sculptor * it is 
then also out of the statue. This is a fact so evident that it 
cannot be disputed ; but how is this fact to be explained if not 
by the relations of anteriority and posteriority, which exist 
between the thought of the sculptor and the statue ? Really, 
if the thought of the sculptor presents itself in the statue — 
which cannot be denied — it is nevertheless not there, but as 
all that which is anterior and superior presents itself in the 
things posterior and inferior which correspond to it, that is to 
say, that it does not the less subsist out of the statue, by rea- 
son that that which is anterior and superior cannot be absorbed 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



65 



by that which is posterior and inferior. It is thus that the 
cause subsists out of the effect, though being in the effect. 

What I have just said concerning the cause and the effect 
is applicable to the end and the cause, between which exist 
the same relations of superiority and anteriority. The end 
subsists, then, out of the cause, though being in the cause. 
Farther, as the cause itself is in the effect, it results that the 
end and the cause both subsist out of the effect, though being 
both in the effect. 

I will resume what precedes in the two following proposi- 
tions : 

1st. The end is simultaneously in the cause and out of the 
cause. 

2nd. The end and the cause are simultaneously in the effect 
and out of the effect. 

This granted : all that which exists in the universe having 
been created with a view to man, to the end that by man the 
whole creation might return to the Creator, God is evidently 
the First End of all things. 

Ail that which is of a spiritual nature, consisting in affec- 
tions and thoughts, that is to say, in living forces always in 
activity to manifest themselves in acts which are proper to the 
cause, the spiritual world includes the causes of all things. 
All that which is of a material nature, consisting in bodies 
more or less gross, manifested by causes which themselves 
proceed from the first end, the natural world is the theatre of 
effects. 

Lastly, the relations between God, the spiritual world, and 
the natural world, being thus absolutely the same as those 
which exist between the end, the cause, and the effect, the 
two preceding propositions reveal to us these two important 
truths. 

1st. God is simultaneously in the spiritual world and out cf 
the spiritual world. 



66 



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2nd. God and the spiritual world are simultaneously in the 
natural world and out of the natural world. 

Thus ; in the creation, everything is bound together and 
connected with God, without the possibility of God being 
confounded with his work. God is the statuary, and the uni- 
verse is the statue which his divine Thought or his Wisdom 
has formed and vivified, with a view to satisfy his divine 
Affection or his Love. 

Thus the universe proceeds from God, not by continuity, 
which would be to deify creation, but by contiguity. 

Thus, in that which concerns man, God and the spiritual 
world are within him, and are also out of him. God is with- 
in man, for man finds God in the recesses of his heart, when, 
by renunciation of his selfish interests, he devotes himself to 
the general good, or sacrifices himself for one of his brethren. 
The spiritual world is within man, for man finds in himself 
his affections and all his thoughts, which evidently belong to 
the spiritual world, since their nature is wholly immaterial. 
But when man is disengaged from matter, or when his mate- 
rial body is for him as if it did not exist, then, though God 
and the spiritual world are in him, he sees them also out of 
him. He sees God as a spiritual sun, and also as man, when 
it pleases the Divinity to manifest himself under the human 
form ; and he sees the spiritual world as a real world, contain- 
ing all that which is necessary to the existence of the man- 
spirit ) for all ihe affections being spiritual substances, and 
all the thoughts spiritual forms, there are found there, by 
means of these substances and these forms, objects corres- 
ponding to the objects of our world, which are of themselves 
correspondences of affections and thoughts. 

Thus, the spiritual world which philosophy had made to van- 
ish by subtilizing it, you can now represent to yourself by 
means of the conception of spiritual substances and forms, as 
having all the consistence of the material world, without sup* 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



67 



posing a single particle of matter. But, though the preceding 
truths are drawn from logical deductions, nevertheless you 
will be able to comprehend them clearly only so far as you 
can abstract your thought from space. Indeed, God and the 
spiritual world being out of the natural world, as the sculptor 
is out of the statue, they are also out of space ; for space is 
proper to the natural world, and consequently exists only for 
this world where all is fixed, regulated, and constant, because 
ends and causes subsist there in their repose. 

Here then is the place to examine the two propositions pre- 
viously announced on the subject of space and time, to wit : 

1st, That space and time are accidents inherent in matter. 
2nd. That space and time cannot exist but in the natural world. 
Let us consider separately these two propositions, and first, as 
to what concerns space : 

1st. Space is inherent in matter: This is evident, for it is 
impossible, by reason of the force of inertia in matter, to con- 
ceive this matter without the idea of space. 

2d. Space can only exist in the natural world : It is easy to 
convince yourself that everything spiritual, that is to say, all 
that which is affection and thought, is independent of space. 
Truly, if man cannot free himself from space when he pleases, 
it is because he is, as to all the parts which constitute him, 
enveloped in a material body, and because he thus finds him- 
self subject to the laws of matter in that which concerns his 
body. Thence it is that, in order to convey himself to any 
place, he is obliged to pass through places which separate him 
from it; but if he abstracts himself from this body, by con- 
centrating himself in his affection and thought, the case with 
him is different, and the trammels of space disappear for an 
instant. I say for an instant, because it is hardly possible that 
a man should make this abstraction long, inasmuch as, living 
in this world in the midst of material objects, his ideas are 
incessantly carried back upon these objects. When, by your 



LETTERS TO A 



will and your understanding you transport yourself in affection 
and thought to an absent friend, or to places which awaken 
agreeable recollections, do you not really abstract space ? This 
space, which so often opposes your desires, only exists, then, 
for you because the material body with which you are clothed 
in this world subjects you to the laws of matter. Thus there 
is, in reality, no space for affection nor for thought ; nor, con- 
sequently for all that which is spiritual, since the spiritual is 
composed of nothing else but affections and thoughts. 
In that which concerns time : 

1st. Time is inherent in matter. This results also from the 
inertia of matter — inertia from which this matter can be sub 
jected to regular movements. The measure of time is owing, in 
fact, to the two-fold motion of the earth upon itself, and around 
the sun, or what is the same thing, to the appearance of the 
double motion of the sun around and in the ecliptic • for you 
know that it is this double motion which gives us the alternate 
return of day and night, and the succession of years. Suppose 
our planet should no longer be subjected to this two-fold mo- 
tion, and should remain immovable — what would happen? 
The sun would no longer have his two apparent motions, and 
would remain for us invariably fixed to one of the points of 
the azure vault : then there would be no more night for the 
hemisphere, which would be enlightened, and which alone 
would be inhabited: no more return of seasons; but one per- 
petual day, one temperature, whose changes for every locality 
would depend upon the irregular variations of the atmosphere. 
How, in such a case, could we measure time? What end 
would be served by the instruments now in use ? Every one, 
certainly, would be obliged to refer to his own sensations. 
In such a state of things, it is evident that we should not mea- 
sure time, for you know that pain and ennui make it appear 
long, while pleasure and absence of mind shorten it; this 
would be then rather the state of the soul, and the different 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



69 



modifications of that state which we should determine. It 
thence evidently results that time is owing to the force of 
inertia of matter, and thus it is inherent in matter. 

2d. Time can only exist in the natural world. Since time is 
owing to the force of the inertia of matter, and since it would 
be impossible to measure it, if material nature were not sub- 
jected to regular motions, it results that time cannot exist 
where the law of inertia does not exist; now this law can 
only exist for matter. In fact, the spiritual, having been en- 
dowed with the liberty or the faculty of moving itself freely, 
cannot be subject to the law of inertia, for this law and the 
law of liberty are by no means compatible. Besides, it is 
easy to see of yourself that time does not exist either for af- 
fections or for thoughts ; you can free yourself from it, whether 
by your will and your understanding you carry yourself into 
the past, even the most remote, which then appears to you. 
present \ or whether by these same faculties you represent to 
yourself the time which is to come. 

I will here add, as an observation, that there is in man an 
innate desire to free himself from the shackles of space and 
time, and this desire, which is ever appearing, is itself, if not 
a proof, at least a strong presumption, that the spiritual world, 
for which man is born, is independent of space and time. 

It is also the consequence which flows from my second 
proposition. In fact, if space and time cannot exist but in 
the natural world, there is in the spiritual world neither space 
nor time. Then how can we form an idea of that world % 
How form a conception of earths, mountains, valleys, meadows, 
gardens, houses, inhabitants there, if there is not space ] 
How admit there that succession of events which, properly 
speaking, constitutes existence, if there is not time there % 

Although the objection seems strong, a few reflections will 

suffice to remove it. Habituated as we are to live in a world 

where we cannot act without being continually subjected to 

4 



70 



LETTERS TO A 



the trammels of space and time, we can hardly conceive of an 
existence freed from these fetters. Our ignorance of the true 
nature of spiritual substances and forms, which are nothing 
else but affections and thoughts, induces us to believe that 
without space and time there would be nothing there ; no in- 
dividual thing; that all would be confounded, or rather that all 
would be annihilated. It is true, it would be thus with our 
world, since space and time are inherent in matter ; but it is 
quite different in the immaterial world. There substances and 
forms preserve their individual state, without having need, for 
this purpose, of space and time. If these substances and 
forms, which are types of the substances and forms which we 
see in our world, were not of themselves in the individual state, 
our world would not exist, since material substances and forms 
exist from spiritual substances and forms. The material and 
spiritual worlds are then both composed of individual things, 
but with this difference, that individual - things in the former 
are subjected to the laws of inertia, whilst in the latter they 
are governed by the law of liberty. 

It thence becomes evident, that there is in the spiritual 
world the equivalent of our space and time, considered only in 
this, that they cause substances and forms to be in the indi- 
vidual state, and not in this, that they place fetters upon their 
action ; for this last property of space and time proceeds from 
their inherence in matter, while they owe their first prop- 
erty to the mode itself of the existence of spiritual sub- 
stances and forms. Yet being obliged, in order to be better 
understood, to compare spiritual things with natural things, 
we give to this equivalent of space and time the name of 
appearance , and we say that in the spiritual world there is 
the appearance of space and time, though to speak more 
correctly, we should say that the mode of existence of sub- 
stances and forms, in our space and our time, is itself a 
gross appearance of their real mode of existence, since instead 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



n 



of acting freely according to their nature, they aie confined 
by space and time in a material prison. Beside s ; how many 
appearances are taken for realities, and how many realities 
for appearances ! If man would only reflect a little upon the 
subject, he would see that in our world everything is tilled 
with appearances which are taken for realities \ and, to cite 
only one example, how many various appearances proceed from 
the apparent immobility of the earth ! 

In conclusion, it remains for us to enquire what it is which 
constitutes for spirits the appearance of space and time. This 
question being connected with other theories which we will 
soon examine, I will satisfy myself for the present with giving 
you a summary solution of it. This appearance of space and 
time's being the real mode of the existence of spirits, must 
necessarily result from the life of each one of them. Conse- 
quently, the different states of the affections of a spirit consti- 
tute for him the appearance of our space, and the different states 
of his thoughts, the appearance of our time. 

I have entered into all these considerations relative to space 
and time, because it is impossible to comprehend clearly spirit- 
ual things if we do not abstract our minds from these two acci- 
dents adherent to matter. 

To think of God from space, is to think of the extent of na- 
ture and to fall into materialism ) but when we think of God 
as out of space and time, though in space and time, we can 
conceive Him to be everywhere present, and in all his entire- 
ness in the greatest as well as the least things. In his qual- 
ity of Infinite, he fills all spaces without being himself, like 
material things, in space ; and in his quality of Eternal, he is 
in all the parts of time, without the divisions of time being appli- 
cable to him. Mathematics prove in fact that the infinite is 
applicable to the greatest as well as to the least thing : and 
philosophy acknowledges that the eternity of God, being anted- 
or and posterior, there is to God himself neither past nor future. 



72 



LETTERS TO A 



To think of the spiritual world from space, would be to 
materialize that which from its nature is immaterial ) but 
when we acknowledge that the spiritual world is out of space 
and time, though it be in space and time in this sense that it 
transmits to the material world the life which it receives from 
God, we can conceive of this spiritual world as really exist- 
ing, without, on that account, assigning to it a fixed and de- 
terminate position ) we can conceive that it is in the natural 
world and out of the natural world ) in man and out of man. 

I propose soon to show you what is the mode of existence 
of the man-spirit. It will then be very easy, by the details 
into which I shall enter, to represent to yourself this immate- 
rial world, of which you cannot as yet have a very clear idea. 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER VII. 

To trace in my exposition the great features of the spiritual 
world, without stopping to reply to the objections which 
might arise in your mind was, as you know, my first design. 
I saw in this the double advantage of enabling you to em- 
brace an idea of the whole at once, and a saving of time in 
the examination of questions, some of which must necessarily 
find a place in the course of the discussion ; others have been 
introduced only because you had not this general idea ; but 
your last letter contains so serious an objection, that I find it 
necessary to examine it immediately. Besides, the desire you 
manifest, to be enlightened as soon as possible on this subject, 
is a sufficient reason for me to return to my preceding deter- 
mination. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



73 



Not to diminish in the least the force of your objection, I 
extract from your letter the whole paragraph which contains it. 

a While reading, in your fifth letter, your views concerning 
the human soul, there arose one objection. I willingly admit 
that it is the human soul alone that suffers when the body is 
injured : I admit also that it is this which suffers in the ampu- 
tated body ) but the argument you use would apply as well to 
animals as to man, for animals experience the same sufferings 
that we do, and an animal having a limb amputated would 
in like manner suffer from a member which it would no longer 
possess. It would seem to result, then, that animals also 
have a spiritual body. I did not first present this objection, 
because I expected to see it removed in the course of your expo- 
sition, as it has happened with many others which I had pre- 
viously submitted. 

" Nevertheless, far from removing this difficulty, your sixth 
letter, on the contrary, has rendered it still more serious, since 
you place in the spiritual world all the objects of the animal 
kingdom. You say, in fact, that there is not a single object in 
our world which is not the correspondent of an object existing 
in reality, that is to say, in substance and form, in the spirit- 
ual world ; and in the enumeration which you make of these 
objects you cite the three kingdoms w r ith all that constitues 
them. Now, to give a spiritual body to animals, and to say, be- 
sides, that there are animals in the spiritual world, is evidently 
assimilating animals to man, for this is not only giving them 
a soul, but it is making this soul enjoy immortality. Relieve 
me at once, I pray you, from the disorder of ideas in which 
these reflections involve me. Your system pleased me ; I was 
rejoiced to see that every one of your letters removed difficul- 
ties which I believed to be inextricable. I was not yet, it is 
true, very familiar with your spiritual substances and forms ; 
but there were so many pleasing ideas in representing man 
spiritually organised, and thus surviving a complete man, after 



74 



LETTERS TO A 



the dissolution of his mortal body, that you led me eagerly to de- 
sire that so beautiful a conception might be a reality. I would, 
I confess, experience regret in abandoning ideas which were 
to me a consoling balm; but I should be compelled to reject 
them if you give a soul to beasts 3 for my reason would decide 
for the complete annihilation of man and animals, rather than 
admit to the privilege of immortality beings deprived of reason." 

I cannot reproach you, my dear sir, for having supposed that 
we attribute to animals an immortal soul, for I expected such 
an objection. When we are heard to say that there are ani- 
mals in the spiritual world, there are few persons who would 
not exclaim : Have beasts also a soul ? This exclamation ap- 
pears to us so natural, that it by no means- surprises us. Men's 
ideas at this day are so vague upon all that concerns man ; 
the discussions of philosophy concerning the soul of beasts, far 
from throwing light on this subject, have thrown so much ob- 
scurity upon it ; there are so many of the learned who by their 
writings have givQn rise to the belief, when yet they have not 
postively said so, that between man and beast there is only the 
difference of more or less — it cannot be surprising that they at 
first should persuade themselves that we also assimilate beasts 
to men. We are, however, far from admitting such an opin- 
ion, which would be in complete opposition to all our princi- 
ples. We, on the contrary, use all our efforts to destroy so 
fatal an error, which introduces materialism into all classes of 
society ; for so soon as there is admitted, between man and 
beast, only the difference of more or less, men are logically led 
to believe that man, like a beast, is annihilated by natural 
death. But to combat this error, instead of having recourse, 
like the old philosophy, to common-place ideas, the impotency 
of which is acknowledged, we will demonstrate that the dif- 
ference between man and beast is so distinct, that it is impos- 
sible, when we have once recognised it, ever to assimilate the 
one to the other. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



75 



Now that I have relieved you by making known to you our 
principles upon this important point, I come to your objection, 
which may be thus stated : 

u If you give a spiritual body to animals, and if, besides, 
there are animals in the spiritual world, you evidently attrib- 
ute an immortal soul to the animal. J? 

To this I reply : 

Yes, we give a spiritual body to animals: also, there are 
animals in the spiritual world ; and yet an animal has not an 
immortal soul. 

Thus, though I admit with you the two propositions which 
lead you to conclude that animals have an immortal soul, I 
maintain the contrary ; but yet I am not at all surprised at the 
conclusion you have drawn, for all other persons would have 
concluded the same, because they are generally ignorant of 
what the nature of man is, what that of beasts, and what are 
the conditions requisite for a being to enjoy immortality. 

As you have hesitated in believing that we attributed a spir- 
itual body to animals, it is my duty to insist at first upon this 
truth which I have just affirmed. You acknowledge, besides, 
that it is a consequence of the principles which I have ex- 
plained to you on the subject of man. Logic says, in fact, that 
if .matter in man is insensible, it must be the same in animals : 
that if there is in man a spiritual organized being, which suf- 
fers when the material body receives a wound, it must be the 
same in like cases with animals ; for it cannot be denied that 
there is suffering with both. Besides, when the insensibility 
of matter and its inaptitude to take any form of itself is recog- 
nised, we are forced to admit the principle of spiritual bodies. 
It results again from our principles that nature is of itself 
dead ; now it is a fact that life is diffused in different degrees 
into all natural bodies, How could each one of them take the 
life which is proper to it if there was not in it a corresponding 
spiritual body adapted to receive this life from the common 



/'6 



LETTERS TO A 



source ? Thus we declare boldly, because it is a truth which 
cannot be combatted but by frivolous objections, that vegeta- 
bles and animals subsist by influx from the spiritual world into 
the natural, and proceed from spiritual germs included in 
natural germs, and nature serves only to fix the spiritual 
which continuously flows into it, in consequence of the ten- 
dency of everything spiritual to clothe itself with a body. 
The animal exists then only because it is the correspondence of 
certain spiritual substances and forms, of which the whole 
together has constituted the spiritual body upon which corres- 
ponding material particles are moulded. 

And here is explained the mystery of the life and generation 
of all that is born, grows up, and and dies. The seed always 
produces the same plant. Why does the acorn always pro- 
duce an oak ? It is because in the acorn the spiritual body of 
the oak already exists. Why have a great many animals and 
principally the saurians, the faculty of reproducing amputated 
members 1 How is it that the foot of a lizard, when torn off, 
grows out again % One of two things — either nature performs 
a miracle, or else material substances mould themselves upon 
the spiritual body, as upon a model. This last solution can 
alone explain why hybrids, mules, &c. cannot reproduce them- 
selves * why the graft can only be performed upon trees of 
the same class, for though material forms may be coupled, it 
is impossible in the same manner to establish spiritual forms. 

From all that precedes then, it results evidently that animals 
have spiritual bodies. I proceed now to my second affir- 
mation. 

There are animals in the spiritual world. This truth, which 
has excited your astonishment, is also a consequence of prin- 
ciples previously announced. If you do not admit animals in 
the spiritual world, you are obliged to exclude from it vegeta- 
bles, minerals, atmospheres, and, in a word, all that corres- 
ponds to the different objects of which nature is composed. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



What becomes then of the spiritual world ? It vanishes com- 
pletely; it is no longer a world, for this world carries with it 
the idea of a thing analogous to the world which we inhabit * 
you can thence form no idea of it : you fall into the abstractions 
of philosophy, and consequently into all your doubts concerning 
the immortality of the soul. 

I readily conceive, however, your repugnance to admit that 
there are animals in the spiritual world. An interior sentiment 
tells you that you have an immortal soul : but taking a view of 
all that surrounds you, you see on all sides beings destitute of 
reason : you know that they live, feel, suffer and have passions 
like men \ you are struck with all the other analogies which we 
observe between the most intelligent of these beings and him 
who is called the lord of creation. Then you hesitate to trace 
the line of demarcation between the reasonable being and the 
instinctive being, particularly when you reflect that many ani- 
mals are often more affectionate or ingenious than so many 
depraved men : and yet, if you grant a soul to the being the 
nearest to man, you are directly forced to give it to the one 
which immediately succeeds, and so descend, step by step, to 
animals which are found in the lowest degree of the scale. At 
this thought your dignity of man revolts and, in your perplex- 
ity you are more inclined to believe in the complete annihila- 
tion of man, than in the immortality of all these beings de- 
prived of reason. 

All these thoughts, which are those of the greater number of 
men of this age, were awakened in you so soon as you saw us 
place animals in the spiritual world. You immediately, called 
to mind that, from their analogy with man, animals must have 
a spiritual body, and you concluded from this that we give an 
immortal soul to beast. You know now that we reject your 
conclusion with all our might; but seeing me nevertheless 
persist in maintaining as true the two propositions which have 
led you to this conclusion, you must be anxious to know why 
I reject it. I proceed to satisfy you. 



78 



LETTERS TO A 



I admit, it is true, that animals have a spiritual body, but 
the conclusion that this body is immortal by no means results 
from the existence of a spiritual body : indeed, if from this 
alone that the spiritual body exists, we are to conclude that it 
is immortal, we should be under the necessity of concluding 
that it possesses existence in itself, and thence it would not 
only be immortal but eternal; now we know that God alone 
is eternal. We shall soon see that the spiritual body of man 
is only immortal because it is the receptacle of the eternal 
life which reposes in the bosom of the Divinity. 

I admit further, that there are animals in the spiritual 
world; but from this proposition it no longer results that 
these animal forms, perceived in the world of spirits, are the 
sofcls of animals dead or to be born upon the earth, and that 
these appearances of animals are immortal individualities re- 
ceptive of the Divine life. 

Here is my reply : not to keep you in suspense I give it to 
you in a few words. As to the proofs of the assertions which 
it embraces, I do not present them here, because they will 
result from the examination of the important question which 
is now about to occupy our attention. 

This grave question known generally under the name of the 
Problem of the Soul of Beasts has excited long discussion 
among philosophers, and has never yet been completly resolved 
by them. Give me then, I pray you, the whole of your attention. 

To ascertain correctly what constitutes immortality, it is 
necessary to have clear ideas concerning esse and existere (to 
be or beings and to exist or existence.) These are generally con- 
founded, because the esse and the existere always present them- 
selves to our view as a one, and thus we cannot see the esse 
but by the existere. We see in fact only that which exists } 
and nothing can exist without having an esse. Nevertheless, 
we can by abstraction consider the esse independently, or sep- 
arated from, the existere, and then the esse is to us the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



79 



thing itself, and the existere is the manifestation of the thing. 
In like manner, we see substances only by their forms, and yet 
by abstraction we can consider the substance independently 
or separated from its form ) and then the substance is to us 
the thing itself, and the form is the manifestation of that thing. 
You may readily see, by means of this distinction, that a thing 
cannot enjoy immortality, but so far as its esse shall be always 
manifested by an existere • for, as results from the very expres- 
sions used in common language, " to cease to exist' 7 is not to 
enjoy immortality. 

As it is the existere which manifests the thing, and which 
constitutes its individuality, or its personality, all the objects of 
nature have their existere while they subsist in this world, 
since each of them is distinct and individual. But is this exis- 
tere so united to their esse that it cannot be separated from it, or, 
in other words, must they always preserve their individuality ? 
And to speak here only of the animal kingdom, as we affirm 
that animals have a spiritual body, and that this body exists, 
since it is it which acts in their natural body, is it united to its 
esse in such a manner as never to be separated from it ? As 
we affirm besides that there are animals in the spiritual world, 
are these animals individualities which have previously exist- 
ed in our world ? Such, in fact, is the principal point of the 
question which we are discussing : for it is very evident from 
what precedes, that immortality cannot belong to any individ- 
ualities except to those whose existere is united to the esse in 
such a manner as to be incapable of ever being separated 
from it. 

It suffices, then, to enquire which are the bodies that fulfil 
this indispensable condition, and which are those that do not 
fulfil it ) for the spiritual body even in its essence is not um- 
mortal, as I have already told you ) it has this prerogative only 
when it is adapted to receive life in its complete state, or, in 
other terms, when it is the receptacle of the Love and Wisdom 



80 



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of God. It is, in fact, in this case alone, as you will see pres« 
ently, that the esse and existere are inseparably united. 

God, we have already said, is Love and Wisdom. Divine 
Love is the Esse Itself; it is this alone which fills and animates 
everything with its life. The divine Wisdom is Existere Itself; 
it is this which manifests the divine Love, which has created 
and disposed all things. 

All the objects of creation derive their substance from the 
Esse Itself which is the first Substance, and their form from 
the Existere Itself which is the first Form (Forme-Type ;) but 
they are receptacles of the Existere in different degrees. Con- 
sequently they all tend more or less to the Form of the Crea- 
tor, or, in other words, to the human form, since God is Very- 
Man. Hence the origin of the great chain of beings, every link 
of which is a lowering from the link which precedes it. 

At the head of this chain is man. If we consider man only 
in his quality of a natural being, he necessarily constitutes a 
part of the chain ) he is the first link of it. But if we consider 
man in his quality of man, he no longer constitutes the first 
link, in this sense, that there is not between him and the fol- 
lowing link the only difference which we observe between any 
two other animals taken consecutively ; it is no longer possible? 
even to establish a comparison : for the difference which dis- 
tinguishes him from the other beings is of an order indefinitely 
more elevated. Man is found, then, above the chain — he rules 
it as the spiritual rules the natural. Thus, on the one hand, 
man connected with all nature belongs to this world, and, on 
the other, he is separated by the spiritual principle with which 
he alone is endowed ; his feet are upon the earth, but his coun- 
tenance looks towards the heavens. 

This truth, which I but announce here, will soon become 
evident to you. God continually diffuses life into the whole 
universe ; but this life, penetrating into bodies, is modified ac- 
cording to the constitution of each of them. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



It is, in fact, evident that man owes the faculty of ascending 
from the effect to the cause, and from the cause to the end, to 
his particular organization. If man had not that elevated fore- 
head which distinguishes him from other animals, he w r ould 
be deprived of this faculty ; for experience proves, that the 
more the forehead is depressed, the less there is of intelligence ; 
and that he is no more than a kind of idiot w T hen the depres- 
sion is very great. Experience proves, besides, that among 
animals, the smaller the anterior part of the brain is, relatively 
to the w r hole, the more inferior is the degree which the species 
occupies in the chain of animated beings. 

Man being able to ascend from effects to causes, and from 
causes to ends, the result is that there are in him the three sepa 
rate or discrete degrees, of which I have spoken in my last let- 
ter. The first of these degrees wdth man, is love, because what 
man loves he proposes for an end ; the second degree is wis- 
dom, because it is by this that the end seeks causes; the third 
degree is the operation of the body, because by it the end 
and the cause are manifested in effects. You know, also, that 
these three degrees are of an absolutely different nature, and 
the connection between them is only by relations of anteriority 
and superiority. The order in which the discrete degrees act 
is called successive order, while that of the continuous degrees 
is called simultaneous order. 

By means of the three discrete degrees, man can receive the 
love and the wisdom of God, or life in the complete state ) his 
will is the receptacle of that love, and his understanding the 
receptacle of that wisdom — the first being warmed by the heat 
of the spiritual sun, and the second enlightened by its light. 
It is thus that man is an image of God ) and as life descends 
into him in its fullness, the esse and the existere are with him 
inseparably united, so that he enjoys immortality, even when, 
by his life in this world, instead of having appropriated the 
love and wisdom of God, he has rejected them far from his 



82 



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heart and his thought ) for in this last case the divine influx 
does not cease to act upon the man, even when he has become 
a spirit ; but man, in consequence of his liberty and rationality 
which he has depraved, changes love into hatred and wisdom 
into folly. 

Man having been created in the image of God, and the or- 
ganization of the beast differing from that of man, it results 
that beasts are not images of God ; thus the chain of animals 
presents to us only successive degradations of the human form. 
Thence it results, at the same time, that animals do not receive 
life in the complete state. This last consequence is besides 
fully confirmed by comparative anatomy. Examine the brain 
of the animal whose form approaches the nearest that of man, 
and you will find that his sinciput presents no kind of compar 
ison with that of man. Now, it is principally in the anterior 
part of the human brain where the understanding resides ; and 
you know that the understanding is the receptacle of spiritual 
light or of wisdom from God. Then, since all beasts without 
any exception, are deprived of this anterior part of the brain, 
it is impossible for them to receive spiritual light in the two 
first degrees which concern ends and causes ; but as they have 
need of being directed in their actions, they receive this light 
in its last degree, which concerns only effects. 

I might here conclude this discussion upon the soul of beasts, 
for it results very evidently from what precedes, that beasts 
do not receive life in the complete state, and thus that the esse 
and existere not being in them inseparably united, they could 
not enjoy immortality. But though solved in principle, this 
question of the soul of beasts is so important, I will seek to cor- 
roborate its solution by examining with you the principal dif- 
ferences which exist between man and beast : you will see by 
this examination, that these differences, which have so much 
occupied the attention of philosophers, are all explained by 
means of the principles that I have now explained to you 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



83 



Man being a receptacle of the wisdom and love of God, has 
been endowed with rationality^ or the faculty of comprehend- 
ing, and with liberty, or the faculty of. willing freely ; conse- 
quently he can reason upon ends, causes, and effects. 

Beasts not receiving the wisdom of God in the first degrees, 
there is not in them either rationality or liberty ; they can nei- 
ther comprehend nor will freely \ thus there is in them neither 
understanding nor will \ but instead of understanding they have 
their science (commonly called instinct), and instead of will 
they have natural affection. The natural affections, which sup- 
ply in them the place of the will, are the affection of nourish- 
ment, that of shelter, re-production, shunning danger, and 
avoiding what is hurtful to them. Every natural affection is 
accompanied with the science which . is proper to it, and it is 
this science which supplies the place of the understanding. 
They have no thought, for they are only in the last degree • 
and this degree, without the superior degrees, gives no fac- 
ulty of thinking of anything whatever of moral or of spiritual 
life ) but, instead of thought, they have an internal sight which 
makes one by correspondence with their external sight. The 
differences which we observe between animals proceed from 
this, that every discrete degree decreases from its most perfect 
state even to its most imperfect state, as light decreases to 
shade. Thus, also, animals decrease; and it is this which 
constitutes the chain of beings in the three kingdoms, without 
any of these beings having the power to ascend out of the 
]ast degree ; man alone is in the three degrees. 

Man receives the divine influence and appropriates it, be- 
cause he is endowed with rationality and liberty. 

The beast receives also this influence, but does not appropri- 
ate it, because it is deprived of rationality and liberty. 

Man being endowed with rationality and liberty, is not 
born into any science, because he is capable of learning them 
all. 



84 



LETTERS TO A 



The beast, on the contrary, being deprived of rationality 
and liberty, is born with all its science, because it is not able 

to learn any. 

In man, the will depends upon the understanding, because 
he can by his understanding elevate himself above the desires 
of his will, and because he can thus, from this elevated point, 
know them, see them, and correct them. In the beast, the 
understanding is in subjection to the will ) or rather its sci- 
ence, which is analogous to the understanding, is in subjection 
to its affection, which is analogous to the will. Beasts always 
act according to the laws of order impressed upon their na- 
ture ; if some appear to act morally and rationally, it is be- 
cause, being deprived of rationality and liberty, they have not 
been able like men to pervert their science and affection by 
depraved reasonings. This is the reason why this science, 
or this wonderful instinct, with which they are endowed, 
never deceives them * this is the reason why it is always the 
same. What seems to be civil and moral in them belongs to 
their science, and is not above their science, since they are 
not in the spiritual degree, which gives the power of per- 
ceiving what is moral, and afterwards of thinking analytically 
respecting it. They can also be instructed to do some things, 
but this proceeds only from the natural which is conjoined to 
their science, and at the same time to their affection, and is 
reproduced either by the sight or hearing : but this never pro- 
ceeds from thought, still less from reason. 

Man, being in the three discrete degrees, can think that he 
wills such a thing, or that he does not will it * that he knows 
such a thing or that he does not know it ; that he comprehends 
such a thing, that he loves such a thing ; and he can express 
his thoughts by words. 

It is not the same with the beast ; as it is only in the last sep- 
arate degree, and cannot elevate itself into the superior de- 
grees, it can only think in a simultaneous order, and not in a 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



85 



successive order, which is to act from a science corresponding 
to its affection, and not to think ; for it cannot ascend from 
the effect to the cause, nor from the cause to the end. Now, 
as it is impossible for it to think analytically, and- see the infe- 
rior thought by any superior thought, consequently it cannot 
abstract, nor thence speak ) it can only produce sounds which 
relate to the science of its affection. Thus in all their actions, 
beasts are led by their affection, by means of their science, 
without rationality or liberty; they are thus led by influx 
from the spiritual world ) for at the sara e time that the heat 
and the light of the natural world act upon their material 
bodies, they receive heat and light from the spiritual world, 
and it is this heat and light which constitute their affection 
and science. 

I will conclude this parallel of man with the beast, by this 
last remark : The man altogether sensual differs from the beast 
only in this, that he can fill his memory with things which he 
has learned, and can think and speak from these things ; and 
this, by virtue of the faculty every man possesses of being 
able to comprehend truth if he is willing. It is this faculty 
which distinguishes him from the brute ) but there are many 
men who degrade themselves below the beasts, by the abuse 
of this faculty. 

To reply to all the points which your objection has raised, 
I would have to explain to you the origin of the animals which 
are in the spiritual world ] but this origin cannot be rational- 
ly understood without knowing the mode of existence of men- 
spirits. As we have not time now to enter upon the investi- 
gation of this subject, it will suffice for the present to say, 
that in the spiritual world the representative forms of the 
affections and thoughts of spirits appear as it were living, 
hence the appearance of animals which spirits see there. 

If your objection has compelled me to interrupt the course 
of the exposition of the spiritual world, it has at least had the 



^6 



LETTERS TO A 



double advantage in leading us to the examination of one of 
the most important questions of philosophy, and to the proof, 
by new arguments, not only that man is immortal, but that he 
alone is endowed with immortality. 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER VIII. 

I had designed, my dear sir, to resume to-day the exposition 
respecting the spiritual world ; but since you have long mani- 
fested a desire to have an idea of the creation of the universe, 
and since this desire is repeated in your last letter, I must has- 
ten to satisfy it. 1 see besides so much the less inconvenience 
in treating this subject, as it will furnish you with new means 
to form more easily a comprehensive idea of the spiritual 
world. Do not expect, however, a complete treatise — the sub- 
ject would require a volume. You wish only to have an idea 
of the creation ) it is then simply a sketch which I am about 
to give you. 

But there is a question, in advance, which I must anticipate ; 
it is true you have not yet asked it; but you certainly 
would ask it, for it always presents itself to the insatiable cu- 
riosity of man, when he meditates upon the creation of the uni- 
verse. 

This question is : 

Can man know what God was before the universe was created ? 

You will agree at once that it matters little to man, so far 
as his happiness is concerned, to know what God was before 
the creation. What advantage could he draw from this knowl- 
edge, if it were even possible for him to acquire it? None 
whatever. Far from being satisfied, his curiosity would on] 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



87 



be increased: and, pursuing his investigations in this unfruit- 
ful field, he would wish to go so far as to understand God in 
his infinity, that is to say, so far as to wish to be God ; for to 
comprehend God in his infinity, it would be necessary to be 
God. The infinite only can comprehend the infinite. 

There are, nevertheless, some spiritualist who imagine 
that after they have left this world, there will be no secret for 
them ; that they will know the how and the wherefore of all 
things. This again is one of the thousand errors of philosophy. 

Yet with little reflection upon the nature of man, it is easy 
to discover, that if an intelligent creature, whether man, spirit, 
or angel, could attain to such a state as to know everything, 
and consequently to have nothing to learn, it would be to him 
the greatest of misfortunes. This is not a paradox; it is a 
truth which it will be easy for me to prove when we come to 
treat of the existence of man in the other world. 

What I have just said on the subject of the infinite is appli- 
cable also to the eternal, for the eternal is that which is infi- 
nite as to existere ; it is then as impossible for any creature to 
comprehend the eternity of God, as it would be impossible to 
comprehend the infinity of God. 

Besides, with man living in this world, in the midst of space 
and time, there is always something of time in the idea which 
he forms to himself of the eternal, just as there is always 
something of space, in the idea which he forms of the infinite. 
Now as time only exists by the creation of the universe, it is 
then absolutely impossible for him to comprehend what God 
ivas before time, that is to say, before the universe was created. It 
is not, however, the same with an angel; though an angel 
cannot, being a creature, comprehend God in his infinity or in 
his eternity ; he can nevertheless form to himself, in some sort, 
an idea of eternity, because the idea of time no longer exists 
with him, and has been succeeded by the idea of state ; for 



88 



LETTERS TO A 



with spirits and angels eternity is not an eternity of time, but 
it is an eternity of states, without the idea of time. 

This question concerning eternity having led me to speak 
to you of the infinite, it will not be out of place to remind you 
here of certain results to which we arrive, when, upon this 
point, we consult mathematics. If it is impossible for us, who 
are continually in space, to place ourselves in a complete state 
of abstraction ) if philosophical meditations offer us only a 
feeble aid, seeing this aid is very often but instantaneous, and 
disappears as soon as our ideas fall back upon the things of 
the world, it is not the same with the exact sciences, the es- 
sence of which consists in abstracting all that can oppose the 
development of thought : the answers which they give us, 
when we interrogate them, are always clear, precise, and so 
exactly formed, that they are established with facility in our 
understandings. Let us see then what they tell us. 

It is, in the first place, recognised as a principle that the 
series of numbers is illimitable, since to the greatest number 
imaginable, the addition of a unit is sufficient to increase the 
result. There are then no efforts of the imagination which 
can fix the limits of the finite, or those of space ; should we 
add to the unit line as many ciphers as there as grains of sand 
in the sea, what we would thus obtain would not be the in- 
finite ) it would always be a number of which an idea could 
be formed, notwithstanding the impossibility of being able to 
determine or fix it. Thence it evidently results, that to pass 
from the finite to the infinite by way of continuity is absolutely 
impossible. 

Other incontestable proofs of this impossibility, are found in 
the surprising results to which we arrive when the sign of the 
infinite (signe de Vinfini) is introduced into the calculation. 
Two examples will suffice to convince you of this. 

Let us suppose that two parallel lines should have between 
them the distance which separates the earth from the sun, or 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



89 



any other distance which you may imagine. Let them be pro- 
longed in thought as far as you wish, they would constantly 
keep this enormous distance without approaching a single hair's 
breadth during their whole course ; this then is the result of 
the very nature of these lines. But if you introduce into the 
calculation the sign of the infinite, which is nothing else than 
to abstract space, you discover that, in spite of the immense 
distance which separates them in space, they meet however 
at the infinite, without having previously passed through any 
intermediate approach. 

Let us take, for example, a branch of the hyperbola and its 
asymptote which would not have between them, at a given 
point, more than the distance of a millimetre (un millimetre). 
Let us suppose these two lines prolonged as far as the imagin- 
ation could permit : calculation tells us that they will never 
meet, though at every step, notwithstanding the slight dis- 
tance which separated them at the commencement of their 
course, the right line has always approached the curve. If 
we wish them to unite, we are obliged to introduce into the 
formula the sign of the infinite (le signe de Pinfini) \ whence 
it clearly results, that in nature there is no longer any infinitely 
small, nor infinitely large, and that the word infinite^ taken in 
its true acceptation, cannot be applied to anything created. 

And it is said that the study of mathematics leads men to 
materialism ! It leads him only whose heart, already corrupted, 
is deaf to the warnings which it gives and whose understand- 
ing, already perverted, rejects the living light which it pre- 
sents. Is it possible, in truth, to prove more evidently that 
we must not confound the infinite with the finite, nor conse- 
quently God with nature % 

The science of mathematics is (as you see) far from deserv- 
ing to incur the reproaches which have been cast upon it. 
If philosophy and theology had each in its sphere developed 
this high question, instead of obscuring it by a crowd of soph- 



30 



LETTERS TO A 



istries, there would not have been so many materialists. It 
is then to philosophy and to theology that the fault is to be as- 
cribed, and not to the sciences, which are so exact, that when 
we wish them to say that which is not true, they immediately 
give the lie to it. 

But should it be replied, the very examples which you have 
just given prove that nature is without bounds, since it is im- 
possible to determine them. Ah ! what matters it if she be 
without bounds, if these examples prove, even by the clearest 
evidence, that which has no bounds preserves its quality of 
finite and differs absolutely from the infinite ? What more 
could be said of mathematics ? Nothing. But religious philoso- 
phy should have posessed herself of these first data, and de- 
veloped instead of obscuring them. 

If religious philosophy, setting out on true principles, viz : 
God is Being itself (Esse.) from whom and by whom every- 
thing exists: he is the first substance and first form (Forme- 
Type,) the " only infinite ; the universe has been created by 
him to be his image and the representative theatre of his glory, 
and it is for this reason that the universe, as an image of the 
infinite, is without bounds or indefinite ; if, I say religious phil- 
osophy had held this language, and taught that there is be- 
tween the infinite and the indefinite, the same difference as be- 
tween the first cause and the effect, materialism or naturalism 
would not have made such ravages in society. 

If the universe, as well the spiritual as the natural, had not 
been separate and distinct from the infinite, it could have had 
no existence : and it is precisely that it may have existence 
that there is, in its natural part, space and time, and in its spir- 
itual part, the appearance of space and time. Without this, 
the objects of the natural world and those of the spiritual 
world would not have been either distinct or varied, or to speak 
with more exactness, there would not have been any objects nor 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



91 



consequently creation ; all would have been confounded in the 
infinite. 

I recollect very well, my dear sir, that you have no sympa- 
thy for naturalism ; but the occasion having presented itself, I 
thought it would not be inappropriate before passing to the 
creation, to show you that mathematics themselves establish a 
distinction between God and the universe. Besides, these 
general considerations upon the infinite are not foreign to the 
subject which Ave are discussing, and cannot but dispose you 
the better to comprehend the whole. 

I come now to the creation ) and since you desire to have 
only a general sketch, I will confine myself to the examination 
of the three following questions : — 

1st. Whence proceeds the universe? 

2d. Could the universe have been created, if God were not 
Very Man % (V Homme Meme.) 
3d. How has God-Man created the universe? 
I, Whence proceeds the Universe ? 

I have already told you that God has not created , the uni- 
verse out of nothing ) this is one of those truths which every 
man endowed with sound reason may at once acknowledge, 
because he sees, without being able to doubt, that it is impossi- 
ble to make something from nothing ; for nothing is absolute 
negation ; and from this negation an affirmation cannot proceed ; 
between these two ideas there exists then a manifest contradic- 
tion. To pretend that God has taken the universe from chaos, 
would not resolve the difficulty, but render it more complica- 
ted ) for it would be necessary to tell what this chaos is, and 
whence this chaos itself could have been taken. In fine, the 
universe has not created itself, since it has just been proved, 
that God and the universe are absolutely distinct ) and that the 
one is the first cause, and the other the effect produced by this 
cause. 

The universe must then necessarily have been created from 



92 



LETTERS TO A 



a substance, which is itself substance, or substance in itself, 
for this is Being Itself, from which proceed all things which 
are ; now. as God is substance itself, or substance in itself, and 
consequently Being Itself, or Esse, it evidently results from 
this, that all that which exists has been created from God and 
by God. Thus it is from God that the universe proceeds. 

Remember, always, that created objects are only the mani- 
festation of Being, or Esse, without for that reason having 
Being, or Esse, in themselves ; since if they had Being, or 
Esse, in themselves, they would be a portion of the Divinity, 
which cannot be admitted. The cause is in the effect, but 
the effect is not a portion of the cause : this we have already 
acknowledged. The being or esse or man is nothing else than 
a recipient of what proceeds from God ; for life, as we have 
seen is one, and God alone is this one only life. Men, spirits, 
and angels are but recipients or forms which receive life pro- 
ceeding from God : and the reception of life is what is called 
existerc. Man believes that he is ; he believes even that he is 
of himself, and yet he is not of himself, but he exists. To be, 
Being or Esse, is only in God. Thus creation was the opera- 
tion by which the Esse, to be, or Being, clothed himself with 
the Existere. 

It is so conformable to reason to think that the existence of 
all things comes from God and from his Esse, or Being, that 
we have met with many religious men who have had this 
thought ; but they have rejected it in the fear of being led to 
believe that the universe is God, or that the inmost principle 
of nature is that which should be called God. This fear came 
from this, that they thought from time and space, which are 
proper to nature ; and from this, that it is impossible to com- 
prehend creation, without abstracting from the thought these 
two accidents inherent in matter. 

Since the universe was created from God and by God, and 
yet is not God, it must necessarily be an emanation from God. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



The truth has also been partly seen by many philosophers ) 
but for want of the knowledge of the existence of discrete de- 
greesj these philosophers have fallen into the most serious 
errors. If this theory had been at their disposal; they would 
have known that these three degrees exist in all created 
things, and are with them as the end, the cause, and the effect* 
Then they would have understood that material nature in the 
work of creation was only the last degree of the divine ray 
(rayon,) and that this degree served to envelope, and to clothe 
the substances and spiritual forms which are in the two supe- 
rior degrees. Of this I hope soon to convince you. 

From all that precedes we must conclude that the universe 
is from God, aud that he has been manifested by an emanation 
from his Being or Esse. 

II. Could the Universe have been created, if God was not Very 
Man? 

I have proposed this question in order to meet an objection 
which you without doubt would have made. You have not 
forgotten, — for it is a point upon which I have much insisted by 
reason of its importance — you have not, I say, forgotten that I 
have established as a principle, in my fourth letter, that God 
is Very Man, and that if we have the human form, it is be- 
cause we w 7 ere created in his image. But, now that we have 
to treat concerning the creation of the universe by God, you 
will not fail to say to me : Is it possible that Gcd, being Man, 
could have drawn the universe from Himself, and given it the 
form which it has % As this apparent impossibility is of a 
nature to raise doubts in your mind which could not be re- 
moved but in another letter, I have preferred showing you at 
once, here, not only that God was able as Man, to create the 
universe, but more, that he could not have been able to create 
this universe, if he were not Man. 

The universe very evidently attests the Love and the Wis* 

dom of him who created it ; it is only Love divine which has 

5 



94 



LETTERS TO A 



been able to furnish for it all its substance ; it h only the di» 
vine Wisdom which has been able, in impressing upon it its 
form, to order so harmoniously all its parts. Now it is impos- 
sible that love and wisdom should exist without a subject ; and 
this subject is man ; to separate these two attributes from 
their subjects, is to say that they do not exist. Can you con- 
ceive of wisdom out of man ? Would it not be necessary for 
you to place it somewhere to give it a form ? and what form 
could you give it superior to that of man ? And what I have 
just said of wisdom is applicable also to love, for the form of 
wisdom is that of love, since love and wisdom are inseparable 
and make one as substance and form. 

You can see by this how vain are the ideas of those who 
represent to themselves God, who is Love itself and Wisdom 
itself, otherwise than as Man, and who place the divine attri- 
butes elsewhere than in God-Man. If the divine love and the 
divine wisdom were not in God-Man, and if one did not con- 
stitute the substance, and the other the form of God-Man, these 
two principal attributes of the Divinity, being nothing more 
than imaginary entities, the universe could not have been cre- 
ated ) for it is evident that the universe must have been pro- 
duced by love and formed by wisdom. 

If, however, you should represent to yourself God-Man as a 
man of this world, and if you should think of him by the sim- 
ple natural idea, it would be impossible for you to comprehend 
how he was able, as man, to create the universe and all which 
it contains ; but if you think of him by the spiritual idea, ab- 
stracting space and time, you will then be able to perceive 
that God-man could be present in all his work, and create it 
instantaneously j for the universe was not created from space 
to space, nor from one time to another ) it was from a single 
cast. This besides is what physical laws sufficiently demon- 
strate ) the motions of the heavenly bodies are so connected 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



95 



with one another, that the whole must necessarily have been 
arranged at the same instant.* 

Is it not true that man, though his thought be in him, and 
though he remain in one place, may nevertheless by this 
thought be present elsewhere, in anyplace whatever, and even 
in a place the most remote from him % Such also is the state 
of spirits and of angels, even as to their bodies ; for you know 
that they are men, and that their bodies are spiritual. If their 
thought is fixed upon a place, they are actually there and in 
body, because in the world which they inhabit spaces and 
distances are appearances, and only make one with the thought 
-which proceeds from affection. Now, if in the natural world 
man can already in thought transport himself instantaneously 
whither he pleases ; if in the spiritual world, the man-spirit is 
always where his thought is, why should we refuse to admit 
that God wdio is Very Man (PHomme-Type), should have 
been able, as man, to be present in all the work of creation ; 
He who in this quality of infinite, is the same in the first as 
in the last, in the greatest as in the least objects ) He who 

* We are not entirely sure of apprehending the author in the sense in 
which he would here he understood, in saying that the creation of the 
universe was necessarily instantaneous, It is very certain, we think, 
that our solar system, for instance, was not created at once in its pre- 
sent state, for the evidence is overwhelming of progressive formations, 
from simpler elements, and going on through immeasurable tracts of 
time ; and this would seem to be a fair deduction from Swedenborg's 
theory of Atmospheric Creations, so strikingly unfolded by the author 
in what follows. If, however, he means that the original projection 
of the universe as the act of the Divine Mind, was instantaneous, we 
can better grasp the idea, although we are still doubtful whether even 
this be not assuming a more distinct conception on the subject than the 
human faculties are at present capable of attaining. But the reader is 
referred to Swedenborg's " Divine Love and Wisdom," No. 156, where 
he treats of this point, and espresses himself in language that seems, 
at first blush, to convey the same idea with that of the passage before 
us, but which is, if we mistake not, designedly more abstract and tran- 
scendental, and that, too, from the very nature of the theme ; for there 
is nothing that so baffles our feeble powers as the origin in time of tho 
material universe,— Ed. 



96 



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fills all spaces without being m space, and all times without 
being in time : He who consequently could not be continuoua 
as is the inmost principle of nature, since he is not in space 1 

It would be to have a false idea of the infinite, and to miscon- 
ceive the true nature of God-Man, if in thinking of his Human 
Body, any invariable stature whatever, whether great or small, 
should be given to him ) for this would be to think from space. 
But we can and ought to represent to ourselves God-Man from 
the appearance of space, for it is thus, when he judges it to be 
useful, that he presents himself to spirits and angels, who then 
see his Human Body under a form in relation to the state in 
which they are as to the reception of love and wisdom ) and 
this visible presence of God agrees perfectly with his continu- 
al omnipresence in the universe which he governs. 

Thus creation may be understood, if space and time are re- 
moved from the thought. Divest yourself of them therefore 
as much as possible, and then you will perceive that there is 
no difference between what is the greatest and least of space. 
Then you will not be able to have any other idea of the crea- 
tion of the universe than that of the creation of every part of 
this universe : you will understand that the diversity in created 
things is from this, that infinites are in God- man and indefinites 
in the first proceeding from God, that is to say, in the spirit- 
ual sun ; and that these indefinites exist in the created universe 
as in an image. 

Hence the impossibility of finding in any place whatever, one 
thing like another : thence the indefinite variety of all the ob- 
jects which we behold. 

III. How has God-Man created the universe ? 

We have already seen that God created the universe, not 
from space to space, nor from one time to another, but by a 
single cast ; and that the universe is an emanation from the 
Divinity. 

But that you may the better understand the important sub- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



97 



ject which engages our attention, I will have recourse to analo- 
gy, and proceed from the known, for experience proves suffi- 
ciently that human reason does not acquiesce in a thing which 
we ask it to admit, hut so far as she can perceive how this was 
done. 

Man having been created in the image and according to the 
likeness of God, who is Very Man, it is in directing our ex- 
amination to man that we shall be enabled to discover by anal- 
ogy how God created the universe. 

It is now generally admitted by science that a sphere of na- 
tural emanations continually proceeds from the body of a man, 
as well as from the bodies of animals, trees, fruits, flowers, and 
even from metals. This sphere, composed of fluids for the 
most part aeriform, and consequently invisible, is more intense 
than would at first be believed, and extends itself to great dis- 
tance. The insensible transpiration, whose emission is so vol- 
uminous and so surprising may give us an idea of the intensity 
of this sphere, and the emanations which affect the smell may 
show us how much it is susceptible of development. Man 
may then be represented as plunged in an ocean of aeriform 
fluids which emanate from his own body. All these emana- 
tions though not visible, are evidently material • but man in 
this world being both spiritual and material, that is to say, hav- 
ing a natural body, and a spiritual body, and these two bodies 
being connected together by laws of analogy, there must also 
from the spiritual body of man constantly emanate a spiritual 
sphere analogous to the material sphere which envelops his natu- 
ral body 5 a simple examination will at once make this evident. 

When it is known that the affections and thoughts are actu- 
ally spiritual substances and forms, it is directly seen that if a 
spiritual sphere emanates from man, it cannot consist but in 
affections and the thoughts which are derived from these af 
fections and which constitute their forms. Thence it is easv 
to be convinced that such a sphere exists around every man; 



LETTERS TO A 



it is sufficient for this to direct our reflections to the astonish* 
ing phenomena which sympathies and antipathies present. If 
two persons who have never seen each other, who do not even 
know each other by name, experience at the first meeting 
sympathy for one another, it is because their spiritual spheres 
are homogeneous and directly harmonize ; if on the contra- 
ry they experience suddenly an antipathy which they cannot 
account for, it is because their spiritual spheres are heteroge- 
neous and repel each other. How many other phenomena, 
still more extraordinary, would find their explanation by 
means of these spheres, and would go consequently to confirm 
their existence ! But this is not the place to occupy ourselves 
in discussing them ; we will examine these phenomena when 
we shall have acquired a more complete knowledge of the 
spiritual world. It is sufficient for the present to have verified 
the existence of spiritual spheres. 

I will add that the natural sphere and the spiritual sphere 
which envelope and surround men, correspond 10 each other, 
as all natural objects correspond to spiritual objects; that they 
are not the man, as it is very easy to persuade himself, is that 
they derive their existence from man, and do not make one 
with him but in this sense, that being extracted from his two 
bodies there is agreement between them and man ; that the 
one drawing its existence from all parts of the natural body, 
and the other from all parts of the spiritual, they are constant- 
ly supported by the natural and spiritual substances which 
emanate from them * that the substances which are contiguous 
to these bodies are continually put into activity by the two 
^sources of the motion of life, the heart and the lungs ; that 
these contiguous substances communicate of their activity to 
those which surround them, these to others, and thus from 
one to another, so that the more the emanations are rerrsoved 
from the substances contiguous to the two bodies of man, the 
less activity do they receive. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



99 



Now if we ascend from the creature to the Creator, we 
shall experience no further difficulty in comprehending that 
God-Man could extract the universe from himself without, for 
that reason, its being confounded with him. It is very evi- 
dent that if man, created in the image of God, is surrounded 
with a sphere of emanations, it is because God, who is Very 
Man, is himself surrounded with a sphere of emanations. It is 
these emanations from God-Man which have constituted and 
which vivify continually the whole universe, as well its spirit- 
ual as its natural part. 

The first sphere which proceeded from God in the work of 
creation, is the spiritual sun, in the centre of which he resides 
as a Being infinite, eternal, invisible, unapproachable. Con- 
sidered thus in his very essence, it is said of him that no one 
can see God and live ) but I have already told you, and soon 
you will be joyfully convinced, that God, having created man 
to love him, and to be beloved by him, to satisfy his divine 
love, has actually rendered himself visible and accessible. 

The spiritual sun, being the sphere contiguous to God, is no 
more God, than the emanations which from the spiritual sphere 
contiguous to man, are man. This again is a new proof of this 
important truth that the universe proceeds from God by con- 
tiguity and not by continuity, and consequently that it is im- 
possible when the true principles are known, to confound na- 
ture with God. 

It is by the intermediation of the spiritual sun that the uni- 
verse was created, and it is also by its means that it subsists. 
The substances which compose this sun are continually put into 
activity by the two sources of the motion of the only life, the 
heart and lungs of God-Man, inexhaustible sources of the divine 
Love and the divine Wisdom. It is thus that the h'rst proceed- 
ing of God is a centre of Life ; its heat is love, the principle 
of all affections, and its light is wisdom, source of all thought. 

At the same instant when the spiritual sun was created, the 



100 



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sun of our world received existence : it was by contiguity, and 
not by continuity, the last term of the Divine sphere, whose spir- 
itual sun was the first term * so that, in the work of creation, 
God was the first end, the spiritual sun the second end or the 
cause, and the natural sun the last end or the effect. It is by 
these two suns, the one purely spiritual, diffusing love by its 
heat and wisdom by its light ; and the other, elementary fire, 
distributing a heat and light purely material — it is, I say, by 
these two suns that were produced all things which exist in 
the spiritual uuiverse, and in the part of the material universe 
which comprehends our solar system ; the first of these suns, 
the centre of life, acting with all the activity of love and wis- 
dom, and the second, deprived of life, receiving and communi- 
cating passively the impulsion which is given to it. Thus God 
is in ends, the spiritual world in causes, and the natural world 
in effects. 

I said before, on the subject of the emanations which pro- 
ceed from man, that the more remote these emanations are 
from the sphere contiguous to man, the less activity they re- 
ceive. This fact is so evident that I rest content with merely 
announcing it. However, as I am going to rely upon it in pre- 
senting to you the principal details of creation, I will here 
confirm it by this simple observation upon odoriferous spheres, 
that the farther we remove from the object, whence they 
emanate, the less the odor is perceived. 

Thus the more remote the emanations from the spiritual sun, 
the less activity have they received. This principle granted, 
it remains to establish what must have been the first nature 
of the emanations which proceeded from that sun. The most 
simple ideas of natural things prove that the individual exis- 
tence of things depends not solely upon this that they are sub- 
stances and forms, but that from the nature of things and all 
necessity, they must be surrounded with atmospheres which 
retain, by their force of compression every substance in its 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



101 



form. Besides, it is known that the heat and light of the na- 
tural sun must necessarily, in order to act with efficacy, be 
tempered by the atmospheres which they pass through. 

Now the spiritual world including objects corresponding to 
those our world contains, analogy demonstrates that every spir- 
itual substance can only be retained in its form by means 
of spiritual atmospheres, and that love and wisdom which are 
the heat and light of the spiritual sun, must from necessity, in 
order to act with efficacy; be tempered by these atmospheres. 
Thence it evidently results that the first nature of the emana- 
tions which proceeded from the spiritual sun and the sun of 
our world, was gaseous or atmospheric. 

I speak here of many atmospheres, because there are actu- 
ally several in each world. You know that certain learned 
men have already admitted, under the name of ether ; a sub- 
stance more subtle and pure than the atmospheric air ; it would 
not then be extraordinary when we say that there exists anoth- 
er still more subtle and pure than ether. It is this indeed 
which the science of degrees proves : this science which gives 
a key to unlock the causes of things, teaches us that in every 
thing there are the three separate degrees, which bear relation 
to each other as the end, the cause, and the effect, or asprior, 'pos- 
terior, and last ; that each degree is distinguished from the other 
by its proper envelopes ; that all the degrees are at the same 
time distinguished by a common envelope covering, and that 
the common envelope communicates with the interiors and 
with the inmosts, which communication by degrees produces 
the conjunction and unanimous action of all the parts of which 
the thing is composed. Thus, in animals, the muscle is a 
compound of moving fibres, which are themselves composed 
of smaller fibres j the nerve is a compound of fibres themselves 
formed of fibrils (very small fibres); in vegetables there are 
assemblages of filaments in a triple order; in metals and 
stones there are also accumulations of parts in a triple order. 



102 



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Since all the visible bodies of nature are in this triple order, 
it must be the same with the natural atmosphere ) whence 
from analogy we conclude that it is also the same with the spir- 
itual atmosphere. Thus there are in each world three atmos- 
pheres, which are distinguished from each other according to 
the three separate degrees, or, to use other terms, which 
exist in relation to each other as the end, the cause, and the 
effect or as the inmost of a thing, its interior or middle, and its 
ultimate or totality. 

The distinction of these three atmospheres, according to the 
three separate degrees, causes each of them to have its own con- 
tinuous degrees. Thus each of them, according to the contin- 
uous degrees, becomes so much the more inert, and so much 
the more dense, the more it approaches its ultimate term or 
inferior places as experience proves in respect to the last natu- 
ral atmosphere, which is our atmospheric air. 

By means of these plain truths concerning the atmospheres, 
it will be easy now to conceive of the creation at once, and in 
one connected idea. The emanations from the spiritual sun 
were three spiritual atmospheres, all three distinct, though 
the second was composed of the first, and the third was com- 
posed of the first and second. 

Each of these atmospheres, in its progression away from 
the spiritual sun, losing continually some of its activity and ex- 
pansion, became more and more inert and dense ; and at last 
the parts the most remote from it, attained to such a degree of 
inertness and density, that they ceased to be atmospheric 
fluids and became substances at rest. They are substances 
at rest which constitute the earths of the spiritual world : and 
these earths, like the atmospheres whence they draw their or- 
igin, are distinguished from one another according to the 
three separate degrees. In the sequel I will enter more at 
large into the details concerning these earths of the spiritual 
world. 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



103 



The natural sun acting conjointly with the spiritual sun, and 
receiving impulsion from it, the emanations which proceeded 
from it were three natural atmospheres corresponding to the 
. three spiritual atmospheres. So, though al] three distinct, the 
second was composed of the first, and the third was composed 
of the first and second. In like manner, each of these atmos- 
pheres, in its progression away from the natural sun, losing 
continually some of its activity and expansion, became more 
and more inert, and more and more dense ; and at last, the 
parts the most remote attained to such a degree of inertness 
and density, that they ceased to be atmospheric fluids, and be- 
came those fixed substances which we call matters. Never- 
theless, as these fixed substances owe their origin to the at- 
mospheres, they retained in them an effort and a tendency to 
produce uses, that is to say, to produce that which is confor- 
mable to the order established by the Creator. Each of these 
substances included in it the three separate degrees, being 
composed of fixed parts which had their derivation from the 
three natural atmospheres; the parts derived from the 
first atmosphere constituted its inmost, and the parts derived 
from the second constituted its interior. Thence is the origin 
of the planets and their satellites, and of the indefinitely varied 
matters which constitute them. Thus nothing exists but from 
a something prior to itself, and so on from a First. This First 
is the sun of the spiritual world ) and the First of this sun is 
God-Man. The prior (or things next to the first) are the at- 
mospheres by which this sun penetrates into the last bounda- 
ries of creation. Those who do not establish the creation of 
the universe by continual intermediations proceeding from the 
first, do but imagine incoherent hypotheses, altogether discon- 
nected from their causes. 

This general view of the creation is found confirmed as to 
what relates to our world, by the recent discoveries of science. 

Chemistry has proved the possibility of reducing the most 
5* 



104 



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solid bodies to the gaseous state, whence it reciprocally results 
that gases could pass to the solid state. 

Newton placed in etherial matter the origin of all things 
which exist : and according to La Place, the greatest geome- 
trician of our age. u it could only be a fluid of an immense ex- 
tent which has given birth to our planets, and that fluid has at 
first surrounded the sun as an atmosphere ) it was upon the 
successive limits of this atmosphere, and by the condensation 
of the zones which it was obliged to separate from in receding, 
that were formed all the planets of our system, as well as 
their satellites/* [Exposition of the System of the World, Book 
V. Ch 9). P. Cuvier expresses himself thus on the assertion of 
La Place : " The conjecture of M. de la Place, that the mate- 
rials of which the globe is composed must have been at first 
elastic, and have successively in cooling taken the liquid con- 
sistency, and afterwards the solid, is much strengthened by the 
recent experience of Mr. Mittcherlich. who ha? compounded 
from parts, and caused to chrystalize, by the fire of high fur- 
naces, many kinds of minerals which enter into the composi- 
tion of primitive mountains. " (Discourse upon the Revolutions 
0} the Earth, p. 11). 

The more progress the natural sciences make, the more this 
theory of Swedenborg. on the material creation, will be found 
to be scientifically confirmed. 

I will here close this sketch of the creation. If, however, 
you desire more light on this subject. I will refer you to the 
treatise of Swedenborg, where you will be able to find it, viz. 
u Angelic Wisdom concerning the Divine Love and Wisdom," 
As to the creation such as it is reported in Genesis, it will 
suffice to read the record of Moses to be convinced that this in 
no wise relates to the material creation. I have already told 
you that I am a Christian in all the extension of this word 
taken in its true acceptation ; thus I have for the Bible the 
greatest veneration : and my reason agreeing with my heart, 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



105 



tells me that this Book is the Word of God. I hope some day 
to cause you to partake with me in my convictions on this im- 
portant point : for I will demonstrate to you that the numerous 
apparent contradictions which we meet with in the Bible are 
all consistently explained, when we are in possession of the 
key which unlocks the inexhaustible treasures that it contains. 
But, for the present, I will content myself in telling' you that, 
while apparently treating of things of this world, the Bible in 
reality only treats of spiritual things, and that the first chapter 
of Genesis speaks solely of the spiritual creation of man, that 
is to say, of his regeneration. Accept, &c. 



LETTER IX. 

I have experienced much pleasure, my dear sir, in learning 
that my last letter has made you familiar with the idea of 
God-Man, and that you have not the least repugnance to con- 
sidering the Creator under the human form. In this you have 
made an immense advance. The difficulties which spiritual 
theories ordinarily present will henceforth disappear from be- 
fore you ) for everything depends upon the idea which is 
formed of God : if this idea is just we can easily conceive of 
the bonds which unite God, the universe, and man ; we can 
comprehend the system of the world ; but if this is false, our 
efforts, however great, will be vain. This explains to you why 
philosophers rest in the impossibility of conceiving an idea of 
the creation, and why this impossibility no longer exists with 
\he disciples of the New Church. 

To philosophical spiritualists God is a pure spirit, or rather 
an imaginary Entity, since according to their idea a spirit has 
neither substance nor form. With so vague an idea of the 



106 



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Divinity, how could they rationally conceive of the creation of 
the universe? Is it possible to construct any thing without a 
basis ? and where would they place theirs ? The bond which 
unites the first cause to second causes and to effects, is want- 
ing ; and the hypotheses which are heaped one above another, 
go to prove only the weakness of their efforts. 

But with God-Man the impossibility of conceiving an idea 
of the creation no longer exists. God is Himself the basis, 
since he is the centre of the universe, and this centre is a focus 
of love and wisdom ; it is the infinite, the eternal Being, in a 
Human Form; it is Very Man, the Archetype whence has 
emanated all that constitutes the two worlds. Then the hu- 
man mind seizes upon this central support; it represents to 
itself the Divinity surrounded by a radiant sun, which diffuses 
all around spiritual heat and light, or love and wisdom; it 
sees formed around this sun those spiritual atmospheres which 
proceed from one another, and which convey even to the ulti- 
mate limits this heat and this light with which they are filled ; 
it sees the limits of these atmospheres cease to be fluids, be- 
come substances at rest, and thus form spiritual earths ; it sees 
the same things operating conjointly in the' material order 
around our sun by the force of expansion which it receives from 
the spiritual sun. It can account for all these facts as soon as 
it knows that the heat and light of our sun extend, by means 
of the natural atmospheres, even to the last limits of our plan- 
etary system ; and that according to recent discoveries of 
science, the formation of the planets is owing to a fluid of an 
immense extent ; it acquires thus the conviction that the uni- 
verse is a work which is continued from the Creator even to the 
last objects of the Creation; and that consequently God-Man, 
who is the common centre, holds it suspended, puts it in motion, 
and governs it as a single coherent whole. Then the human 
mind incurs no danger of confounding God with the universe, 
nor the spiritual with the natural ; for it can know, by the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



107 



science of degrees, that the first proceeding and those which 
are posterior co-exist according to their order, in the more 
remote or the last, in the same manner as ends and causes 
co-exist in effects : then it can have the idea concerning God, 
that he is all in all, that he is omnipotent, omnipresent, omnis- 
cient, infinite and eternal ) then, also, it can have an idea of 
the order according to which God-Man by his love and wisdom 
disposes all things, provides for all, and governs all. 

And observe, that when an idea is thus formed of God it 
cannot be said of him that he is here or that he is there since 
he is in the inmost of everything. It is then in the inmost of 
our hearts that he truly is ) it is there that we should seek him 
and it is there that we shall find him. 

Do not forget, however, that God, his first proceeding and 
the posterior proceedings, are not only in the last but are also 
around these last, the same as the end and the causes are not 
only in the effects which they produce, but around those 
effects ; it is this truth which I have before demonstrated to 
you by the example of the sculptor and the statue. Thus, 
though the spiritual world is, like God, in the interior of our- 
selves, it nevertheless presents itself to our eyes around us, 
when our soul is freed from the shackles which bind it to this 
world. If this w T ere not so, the soul remaining absorbed in 
God would have no enjoyment but for itself, which would 
be only a selfish pleasure, and for that reason alone opposed to 
the essence itself of love or of God ) whilst by means of this 
exterior manifestation it can love out of itself in returning up- 
on its likenesses the love which it receives from the Divinity : 
thus it is in a reciprocal communication of love in which the 
happiness of eternal life consists. To love his images is to 
love God. 

Let us examine now what the universe at first was in its 
general constitution. 
You have seen that the sun of our world was created at the 



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same time as the spiritual sun ; that it was by contiguity, and 
not by continuity, the last term of a divine ray whose spiritual 
sun was the first term, aud that our planetary system was cre- 
ated by the intermediation of the natural sun. Now you know 
that astronomy assigns to our planetary system but a very small 
place in the material universe. You should therefore from 
this conclude that at the instant when the extremity of a di- 
vine ray created the sun of our world, thousands of other divine 
rays from the spiritual sun, created in all directions thousands 
of natural suns : and that when the three natural atmospheres, 
corresponding to the three spiritual atmospheres, issued from 
our sun and constituted its planets, similar atmospheres diffus- 
ed themselves around each of these thousand suns, and that 
this natural universe was strewed with millions of terrestrial 
globes. 

Every natural object, corresponding to a spiritual object of 
which it is the effect, and by which it exists, as every effect 
exists from a cause, it becomes evident that the immaterial 
universe includes millions of spiritual earths by means of 
which the earths of our world exist and subsist. There is, 
however, an important remark to be made j it is that the three 
spiritual atmospheres formed immaterial earths distinct ac- 
cording to their degree, whilst the natural atmospheres con- 
tributed all three to form, the one the inmost, the other the 
interior, and the last the ultimate, of the material earths. This 
difference, of which I have before spoken, results from this, 
that the spiritual earths not being subjected to the laws of space 
and of time, those of the second and of the third degree, though 
contained within those of the first degree, can appear out of 
these, whilst the natural objects being governed by the laws 
of space and time, their interior and their inmost cannot be 
disengaged from their envelope. It thence results that every 
natural earth corresponds to three spiritual earths, distinct from 
each other, according to the three degrees. 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 109 

Thus the spiritual atmosphere of the third degree ? or that 
which, being the purest, remained nearest the source of life, 
formed as many spiritual earths of the third degree as there 
are terrestrial globes in the material universe. It was the same 
with the spiritual atmosphere of the second degree ) and the 
same also with the spiritual atmosphere of the first and least 
pure degree, in a word, that which was the most remote from 
the spiritual sun. Remark besides, that according to the prin- 
ciples of the science of the three separate degrees, principles 
which I have explained in a preceding letter, every earth of 
the third degree constitutes the inmost of the corresponding 
spiritual earth of the second degree ; that these two earths 
constitute afterwards the inmost and the interior of the spirit- 
ual earth of the first degree which corresponds to them, and 
that these three spiritual earths are at the same time contain- 
ed in the natural earth, which is in correspondence with them, 
but only in the same manner as the first cause and second 
causes are contained in the effect. 

All that I have already said to you concerning the end and 
the causes which are contained in the effect, though from 
their nature they are immaterial, would be quite sufficient to 
convince you that God and the spiritual world are in the nat- 
ural world, without for that reason occupying there a single 
point of space. But when the abstraction of space is in ques- 
tion, this cannot be too thoroughly insisted upon ; let us not 
then neglect any means of conviction. 

Instead of directing our examination to the whole of the 
universe, let us consider at first only one of its parts, our earth 
for example. That which we will say of our planet in partic- 
ular will apply afterwards to all other parts of the universe, 
and consequently to the universe in general. 

The earth, being an effect which has for causes the spiritual 
earths to which it corresponds, these spiritual earths are with« 
in it, but they are in it as the soul or spirit of man is in hi a 



10 



LETTERS TO A 



inaterial body. Now, no anatomist has ever discovered the 
spirit or soul in the human bod}'; if then it were possible to 
penetrate iuto the interior of the earth, neither would spiritual 
earths be discovered there, though they are really there, the 
same as the spirit or soul of man is really in his material body. 
And why would they not be discovered % It is because every 
part of a spiritual object, however small it maybe, is also in 
the corresponding part of the natural object as the cause is in 
the effect. Thus concerning our earth, and the three spiritual 
corresponding earths, there is not an atom of the spiritual earth 
of the third degree but what is in the corresponding atom of 
the spiritual earth of the second degree, not an atom of this 
which is not in the corresponding atom of the spiritual earth 
of the first degree, and not an atom of this last which is not in 
the corresponding atom of our earth ) for the spiritual earth of 
the second degree is an effect in relation to that of the third 
degree ; the spiritual earth of the first degree, an effect in rela- 
tion to the two preceding ; and our earth an effect in relation 
to these three spiritual earths. Thence it evidently results 
that our earth can contain the three spiritual earths to which it 
corresponds, without these earths occupying the least space 
in its interior. If it is thus with our earth, it is the same with 
all the planets of our system, and each of these planets con- 
tains in like manner the three spiritual earths to which it cor- 
responds ) it is also the same with the millions of globes which 
gravitate in space, and consequently the whole spiritual world 
is contained in the natural world without occupying there the 
least space. 

I will make at this time on this subject but a single remark : 
the spiritual exercising thus within the natural an action, and 
this action being necessarily so much the more active as tho 
spiritual is more internal, it results thence that the nearer the 
bodies which constitute the whole of the globe are to its cen- 
tre, the more should they be penetrated with heat. Now tho 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



111 



experience of modern science, goes to confirm this consequence 
oi our principles, by proving that the more the thermometer is 
sunk into the interior of the earth, the more the mercury rises. 
The learned inquire into the cause of this fact, and have writ- 
ten long dissertations to discover it ) but alas ! it is to them 
with this cause as with almost all other causes ; it is in vain 
for them to inquire, because they persist in remaining in their 
false course. How many fruitless labors would they avoid, 
and what progress would they make in the sciences which 
they cultivate, if they knew, or were willing to take cogni- 
zance of, the true spiritual principles. 

As to the exterior manifestation of the spiritual world, as it 
constitutes the new theatre upon which we must eternally 
live, it is this which it concerns us above all to examine. 

The spiritual universe being divided into three parts wholly 
distinct, and connected only between them by relations which 
exist between the end, the cause, and the effect, we denom- 
inate the spiritual earths of the third degree with their atmos- 
pheres, the inmost or third heaven ; those of the second degree, 
the second heaven ) and those of the last degree, the first 
heaven • this last is called the first heaven, because according 
to the appearance it is nearer the natural world. You see also, 
from what precedes, that each of these heavens includes aa 
many spiritual earths as the natural universe includes terres- 
trial globes. 

This division into three heavens consists in this, that the 
second heaven is to the inhabitants of the first heaven as invis- 
ible as this first heaven is invisible to the inhabitants of the 
natural world ; and in this, that it is the same with the third 
heaven in respect to the inhabitants of the second : but as the 
inhabitants of the heavens are freed from the shackles of space 
and time, they can visit the different earths of their heaven, if 
they desire it, whilst we men who are yet subject to the laws of 
space and time cannot leave the planet on which we now live 



LETTERS TO A 



As to the nature of the spiritual earths, you have seen in the 
general view given of the creation, that all the bodies of a ma- 
terial nature are in a three-fold order, and that their inmost 
corresponds to the third degree or to ends, their interior to the 
second degree or to causes, and their ultimate or first degree 
to effects. Now the two worlds, by virtue of their creation, 
corresponding the one to the other, not only in the whole, but 
also in each of their parts, however small it may be, it results 
thence that the earths of the natural world can by analogy 
give us a knowledge of the nature of the earths of the spiritual 
world. However, to have a just idea of the earths of these 
three heavens, it is neccessary to form an idea as to what 
must have been the nature of the natural earths at the epoch of 
which we are treating. All the objects which then composed 
the universe were at the same time good and beautiful, since 
they all emanated from God, and had not yet undergone any 
alteration. Thus the inmost of objects of which material na- 
ture was then composed corresponded to the things which con- 
stituted the earths of the inmost heaven ; the interior of these 
same objects to the things which constitutes the earths of the 
second heaven; and the objects themselves to the things of the 
earths of the first heaven. The difference which exists be- 
tween the inmost of a thing, its interior, and its ultimate, should 
easily enable you to comprehend that which exists between 
the earths of the three heavens. 

Such, in the beginning, was the general constitution of the 
immaterial universe : but there were afterwards produced 
changes in the spiritual organism, of which I am now about to 
speak. 

I have shown you, in my second letter, what was the end 
which God had in creating the universe, and you have acknowl 
edged that this end would have failed if man had not been 
free to love God or not to love him, that is to say, if he had 
not been free to conform to the laws of the divine order or to 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 113 

infringe them. It thence results that the free will of man is 
itself one of the principal laws of this order: so that God who 
never contravenes the laws which his wisdom has established, 
is careful not to destroy this liberty of man. and has recourse 
to other means to preserve the order of the universe, which 
man, from his present nature, is always disposed to destroy. 

Man being in the likeness and image of God, or, in other 
words, man having been created the receptacle of the love 
and wisdom of God, received, by this very organization, a 
power of changing, w 7 hich was perverted by the abuse which 
he made of his free will. We have seen in fact that man re- 
ceives and appropriates the divine influence because he is en- 
dowed with liberty and rationality, w T hilst other beings, having 
neither free will nor the faculty of reasoning, receive this in- 
fluence but do not appropriate it. Give me for a moment all 
your attention. The divine influence is none other than the 
life which emanates from God, and life is composed of affec- 
tions and thoughts, which are themselves spiritual substances 
and forms ) this we have already acknowledged. This granted, 
man continually receiving life appropriates to himself thus at 
every instant spiritual substances and forms which emanate 
from God, and these substances and these forms are real 
objects of spiritual organism. But the affections and the 
thoughts which man receives from God, being appropriated 
by him become, by that very reception, affections and thoughts 
of man ; now man being thus himself a centre of continual 
emanations, they enter, in emanating from him, into the spir- 
itual organism, but changed from their primitive substance 
and form, if this appropriation is not made conformably to the 
laws of order, that is to say, if man has separated himself from 
the divine laws. 

You may jndge now of the modification which the spiritual 
organism must necessarily have undergone when man appear- 
ed in the universe \ I say when man appeared in the universe,, 



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for reason teaches and the new sciences prove that the ttni* 
verse must have existed long before it was inhabited by man. 

Thus, so long as man returned to his Creator the love and 
the wisdom which he received from him, that is to say, so long 
as he lived comformably to the laws of divine order, the affec- 
tions and the thoughts which he appropriated to himself pre- 
served their primitive purity ; and his emanations being for 
that reason in homogeneity with the emanations which pro- 
ceed from God by the spiritual sun, the universal organism re- 
ceived from it no alteration. But when afterwards men began 
to transgress the divine laws, the affections and thoughts 
which they appropriated to themselves, lost their primitive 
purity, and were so much the more estranged as the infrac- 
tions became greater. Man's infractions of the divine laws 
were at first trivial ; for every thing in the universe, as well 
in its spiritual as in its natural part, proceeds by gradations : 
and besides, it is even now acknowledged that man does not 
suddenly pass from an extreme good to an extreme evil. The 
first transgression that men committed was only a desire — the 
desire of being led of themselves, instead of suffering them- 
selves to be freely directed by God as at first ; but though this 
desire did not at once precipitate them into evil, it is most 
true that those who conceived it lost some of the purity of 
their fathers. 

This was the commencement of the perversion of the divine 
order by man, or in other words, the beginning of mairs fall. I 
can readily conceive the repugnance of men of the world, 
when the fall is mentioned : it is not that they generally deny 
the primeval existence of a paradisiacal age : they are ready 
to admit that the human race is degraded • but when they 
recollect what, in their childhood, has been taught them con- 
cerning the fall, their reason revolts. And could it be other- 
wise, when they know that the old theology still persists, even 
in this age, in teaching that the fault of a single man was the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



115 



cause of the condemnation of the human race % Is not this to 
attribute injustice to God and is it to be wondered at that 
the reason of man should refuse to receive such instruction 
any longer? 

This allusion to the fall is but incidental : it is my intention 
to show you only, in a few words, that it was progressive, and 
not instantaneous, and that it was the declension of man in 
the aggregate, and not in the single individual. We will ex- 
amine this dogma at another time. 

There is one law of the divine order whose existence you 
will readily acknowledge : this is the law of transmission by 
germs. If the agriculturists make choice of the best grain for 
seed j if breeders of cattle choose the healthiest and best formed 
for the propagation of the species ; it is because the experience 
of all time has proved that bodily defects are transmitted in 
increasing progression from germ to germ. This law exists 
for the moral and spiritual as well as for the corporeal part of 
man ) it has been recognised by all good observers, but what 
prevents it from being evident in that which concerns the 
moral and spiritual part is, because man, by the education 
which he receives, can conceal his desires and his thoughts ; 
it is, besides, because being endowed with free will and ra- 
tionality, he can be reformed • but it is always a truth that he 
is born with a propensity to apparent and hidden defects de- 
rived from his parents. I will dwell more on this subject 
when we come to treat on original evil ; for this evil consists 
in the transmission of evils and falses which accumulate from 
generation to generation, and not in the simple transmission 
of the crime of one man. 

The men who had not originally the desire for self-guidance, 
but who had only conceived this desire during their life in the 
natural world, transmitted it to their offspring according to 
this general law of order ; it was weak with the first, and be- 
came stronger with the next generation. Yet these were still 



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good, though their goodness had more degenerated than that 
of their fathers ; but the propensity to depart from the laws of 
order increasing from generation to generation, men at length 
fell into evil. There has been, since then, between the divine 
emanations which constituted the primitive spiritual organism, 
and the emanations of men fallen into evil, a real antagonism ) 
and as spiritual objects are not subjected to the laws of gravity, 
but observe those of spititual attraction, that is to say, of sym- 
pathy, all those spiritual objects which resulted from the vitia- 
ted emanations of these men, reuniting according to the laws 
of spiritual attraction, constituted an organism distinct from 
the first and altogether inverted. We have called the first, 
heaven, we will call the last, hell. This word, without doubt, 
sounds harsh in your ears : so many absurdities have been 
spread concerning hell, that a man of the world now-a-days 
cannot even hear the name pronounced without smiling ; but 
be good enough to wait a little, and you will soon acknow- 
ledge that we can speak of hell, and believe that there is a 
hell, such as it actually is, and not such as it has hitherto been 
described, without for that reason being obliged to make the 
least renunciation of the use of the intellectual faculty. 

Hell, like heaven, has its atmospheres, and its earths ar- 
ranged according to separate or diserete degrees. In fact, by 
appropriating to themselves, and by perverting the divine em- 
anations, these men and those who from generation to genera- 
tion followed their example, did not, on that account, invert 
the order of their degrees, The exterior good, or the good 
of the first degree, became evil, but this evil was exterior, or 
the evil of the first degree; interior good became interior evil, 
and inmost good, inmost evil; it was the same with truth, 
which, according to its degree, was changed into the false of 
the same degree. If you wish to form to yourself an idea of 
the infernal earths, represent them to yourself as composed of 
all that is bad and deformed in that which constitutes our 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



U7 



earth. The inmost of bad and deformed objects corresponds 
to the things which constitute the earths of the ihird. or deep- 
est hell; the interior of these objects, to the things which con* 
stitute the earths of the second hell, and these objects them- 
selves, to the things which constitute the earths of the first 
hell. You will also judge of the difference between the infer- 
nal earths, by the difference which there is between the in- 
most of a bad and deformed thing, its interior, and its exterior 
or aggregate form. 

Thus hell is subsequent to heaven ; it was not created by 
God, since God was love itself, and wisdom itself : love could 
not beget hatred, nor wisdom folly; but hell is from man; 
man alone created it, and he created it by means of that power 
to modify which he had received, and which in his hands has 
become altogether destructive of the works of God, by the 
abuse which he has made of his free will. If any difficulty is 
experienced in comprehending that man has such a power, it 
arises entirely from the erroneous ideas which the false philos- 
ophy and theology have incessantly spread about God and 
creation. Why does the belief that there is no hell so exten- 
sively prevail ? Because it is repugnant to reason, not only to 
require faith in the descriptions generally given of it, but also 
to believe that God created a place of torment. But if God 
has not created hell, by whom was it created % At this ques- 
tion, moralists are silent ; some theologians believe they have 
overcome the difficulty, by saying that rebellious angels have 
been cast down into the abyss. But was not this abyss the 
eternal prison in which they were to be confined ? Who then 
created it ? And yet theologians and moralists admit the in- 
finite goodness of God, and recognize the necessity and reality 
of hell. W.iy do they find it impossible for them to reconcile 
the infinite love of the one with the existence of the other? 
Why ! because they have only vague notions concerning God 

6 



118 



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and the world of spirits; because, consequently they have 
been unable to form a just idea of the creation. 

The idea generally prevailing upon this important subject, 
is, that the universe being once formed, creation ceased. 
Some philosophers, seeing that every thing is renewed by 
means of germs, believe that nature perpetuates herself. On 
the other hand, theologians, relying upon the letter of the 
scriptures, without seeking to penetrate into their spirit, say 
that all things were made by the Word ; and upon this first 
point they are perfectly correct, as you will afterwards ac- 
knowledge, when we come to discuss the dogmatic questions 
together ; but they fall into a gross error in adding that every 
thing was created by this alone, that God spake a word, or 
gave an order, as an absolute sovereign would do in. a king- 
dom. 

When it is believed that the Creator is a Being without sub- 
stance and form, and that the universe was created out of noth- 
ing, how can errors be avoided ? But if is admitted that God 
is substance itself and form itself [Form-type) , and that the 
universe emanated from him, then difficulties disappear ) for 
then it is easy to admit as a principle that all production is a 
continued creation. 

It is true that the universe is from a single outbirth, for it 
was not created as I have before told you, either from space to 
space, or from one time to another ; but it by no means thence 
results, that creation was terminated by its formation. The 
universe being an emanation from God, cannot but subsist by a 
continual emanation from the Divinity. If it were possible 
that this emanation could be suspended one instant, the two 
worlds, the natural and the spiritual, would be instantly de- 
prived of life, and the universe, both material and immaterial, 
would subsist no longer. Creation then continues every in- 
stant, without the least interruption. If it appears stable to us, 
it is because God is not inconstant as man is, and does not 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



119 



overturn to day what he did yesterday. In God's incessant 
creation he always conforms to the laws of his own divine 
order. 

If to the considerations which. I have previously presented 
to you, you now add the principle that all production is a con- 
tinued creation, you will experience no further difficulty 
in comprehending that man had the power to create hell. 
Take notice, however, that I do not take the word "create" 
in the acceptation of producing out of nothing ; but in saying 
that man had power to create hell, I mean that he had power 
to render bad and deformed the good spiritual substances 
and the beautiful spiritual forms which emanated from God, 
and which he appropriated to himself; I will even add that 
in introducing thus the evil and deformed into the spiritual 
organism, he introduced them also into the natural organism, 
according to the laws of correspondence between the two 
worlds. 

The creation of hell w T as not the only change which man in- 
troduced into the spiritual organism ) there is still another 
which I must also make you acquainted with. 

When hell was constituted by man's perversity, or in other 
words, when men after having progressively separated them- 
selves from the supreme good, fell at length into evil, they did 
not all become perverted to such a degree as no longer to have 
in them either good or evil. There were even many who still 
fluctuated between the good and evil, between the true and the 
false. The emanations of these being a mixture of good and 
bad substances, and beautiful and perverted forms, could nei- 
ther enter into the celestial organism, where all is good and 
beautiful, nor into the infernal organism, where all is evil and 
deformed; they composed consequently a spiritual mixed or- 
ganism. In its external manifestation, the earth of this new 
organism holds the middle between the earth of the first 
heaven and that of the first hell ; it is composed of objects like 



120 



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those of our earth, except the difference between what is spir- 
ritual and what is natural ; and presents thus a mixture of the 
good and the bad ; of the beautiful and deformed. We give to 
this part of the spiritual world the name of World of Spirits. 

Such are the changes which the fall of man has introduced 
into the spiritual organism of the globe which we inhabit. I 
have presented them to you briefly, that you may know what 
is now the general division of this spiritual world, whose ex- 
ploration we have undertaken to make together. 

I will conclude this letter by impressing upon you this re- 
mark, that notwithstanding these changes in the spiritual or- 
ganism, all its parts are at the same time contained in the nat- 
ural organism : they are there as good and evil, the true and 
the false, are in man, for man, we shall see in the course of 
our discussion, is himself a microcosm, or little world. In 
tine, if our natural organism remained entire whilst the spiritual 
organism has been divided, the reason of this is easily to be 
perceived. The objects which compose the latter have, as I 
have already shown you. been capable of being separated 
from each other, and this separation was effected at the instant 
that there was antagonism between them; but it could not be 
the same with corresponding bodies of the natural organism, 
because the laws of space and time opposed, in an absolute 
manner, their separation. 



LETTER X. 

I have, in my last letter, made you acquainted with the 
piincipal divisions of the spiritual world : I shall speak in this 
respecting the beings who inhabit them ; but permit me first 
to revert to a question which has already been incidentally 
treated upon. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



122 



I have shown, in my fifth letter, that all the intelligent be- 
ings who exist in the immaterial world, it matters not what 
name has been given to them besides, are men, and have all 
first lived upon natural earths before inhabiting the othei 
world. This proposition being the fundamental basis of the 
subject which is about to engage our attention, I must have re- 
course to all the means which can confirm it, and add to 
proofs already given those which the present state of our dis- 
cussion permits me to employ. 

As hell is posterior to the primitive creation, I will here 
treat concerning those spiritual beings only to whom the name 
of Angels has been given ; besides, what I am about to say of 
angels will equally apply to all other intelligent beings. 

If angels had not originally lived upon natural earths, that is 
to say, if they had not been clothed, as we are, with a material 
body which they restored to the earth from which it was taken, 
they must necessarily have been angels immediately created 
such. It would then be necessary to suppose that God would 
have been able to create the spiritual without adjoining to it a 
natural suitable to contain it, and serve it for a basis and sup- 
port. Now such a supposition cannot be admitted by those 
who are acquainted with the order which has presided at the 
creation. You have seen, truly, that the universe is a cohe- 
rent whole, in the centre of which is the spiritual sun, and 
that from this sun even to the most compact objects of nature, 
everything must be connected by contiguity, according to the 
order of separate or discrete degrees, so that the last degree 
should be the continent, the basis, and the support of the two 
prior degrees. 

If to this you add that the emanation which has created the 
universe, being in potency a compound of substances and forms 
of the three degrees, it was impossible that these substances 
and forms, as they develope themselves in acts, should not be 
connected according to the order of these degrees; you will 



122 



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then easily understand that God could not create any spiritual 
being without there being a natural, which might contain the 
spiritual, and that consequently to have angels, it was abso- 
lutely necessary that he should create intelligent beings clothed 
with a material body, that is to say, men. 

It is true that our modern psychologists do not conceive of 
the spiritual in this manner ; but to what results have they 
thus come with their vapory ideas % They have so refined 
away the spiritual, that it has become for them as if it did not 
exist. But you, who now know that there is nothing spiritual 
without substance and form, because that which has neither 
substance nor form cannot either exist or consequently sub- 
sist, and is absolutely nothing but a creation of the imagina- 
tion, or a being altogether chimerical — you will understand 
without difficulty that spiritual substances and forms, could 
not have any consistence if they had not for their continent, 
basis, and support, natural substances and forms, which are 
their last degree or their effect. 

Remark, besides, that if God had been able to create in his 
likeness and image beings capable of loving him freely, with- 
out these beings having been obliged to live first in the last 
degree of creation, that is to say, in the natural world, it would 
have been, for this end, useless to create this natural world. 
What was, in fact, the end which God had in the creation of 
the universe ? We have already seen it, and it is impossible 
to discover any other, — it was to create beings who could re- 
ceive his love and freely return it to him. Now, if it were 
possible to attain this end by an immediate creation of angels, 
was it not useless to create man and the natural world ? 

One of the consequences of the principles which we are 
discussing is, that the spiritual world must have remained a 
long time without being inhabited. This might, at the first 
thought, excite surprise ; but if our earth, which no one at this 
day will deny has revolved for ages around the sun, without 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



123 



having had upon its surface any of the beings for which alone 
it was nevertheless created, why should we be astonished 
that the earths of the spiritual world, to which it corresponds, 
should have been for a little longer time without receiving those 
who were to inhabit them % We who live in the midst of time 
may think it extraordinary that worlds should have remained 
uninhabited for ages ; but should not our surprise cease as 
soon as we reflect that ages are but an instant to Him who 
is eternal % We should not be any more astonished at this, 
that all the earths of the spiritual world have been inhabited 
posteriorly to the natural earths which correspond to them. 
But are we to conclude from this that there were not angels 
in the spiritual world before man appeared upon our earth 1 
Certainly not. The natural universe, as you know, contains 
myriads of terrestrial globes, all of which, created to receive 
men, were certainly not all inhabited at the same moment; 
some have perhaps been inhabited for millions of years, and it 
may be possible that others are not inhabited yet. Nothing 
then can lead us to believe that our globe was inhabited before 
there were angels in the spiritual world. What we have a right 
to affirm on the subject of our planet only is, that it had in- 
habitants before the part of the spiritual world to which it cor- 
responds had any ; but it must always have been necessary that 
one of the earths of the natural world should have been first 
inhabited, in order that there might be angels in the heavens. 

These new considerations, added to those which I have pre- 
sented to you in my fifth letter, prove very evidently, that the 
angels at first lived as men in the natural world. 

Nevertheless, as what I have said in discussing this subject, 
has been based upon the principle that the spiritual can have 
existence only so far as it is contained in a natural, which 
serves it for a basis and support, it remains for me yet to solve 
a question which you would doubtless soon address to me if I 
'id not suggest it at this time ; the angels having restored to 



124 



LETTERS TO A 



the earth the material body, which in our world, served them 
for a continent, basis, and support, what is the natural which 
serves for a basis now % 

This question, my dear sir, from its nature enters into the 
general discussion , and you will there find it explained j how- 
ever not to detain you longer for an answer, I will say at once, 
that it is the human race itself which supplies this function. 
This need not be a matter of astonishment to you, as there can 
be nothing in the natural world more suitable than man to 
serve for a continent, basis, and support to beings who have 
lived men, and who still live in a human form. As to the 
manner in which angels and spirits are contained in man, it is 
only in the course of the general discussion that we shall be 
able to make this clear • to this discussion then I now come. 

Since spirits and angels have all once lived as men on the 
natural earths before inhabiting the other world, the most cer- 
tain means of forming an idea of spiritual beings is first to ac- 
quire a knowledge of man. Being in the likeness and image 
of God, man must have been, and was really, the summary of 
the universal creation ; and it was for this very reason that the 
ancients used to call him a mic7'Oco§m ) that is to say, a little 
universe. Thus the enigma of man, the enigma which for so 
many ages philosophy has sought in vain to discover, this can- 
not be explained but by meditating upon the creation of the 
universe. God being Very Man, all the emanations which 
proceeded from him must have been a continual effort to im- 
press upon creation his image or the human form. Bo you 
desire a proof of this? Survey the scale of beings: those 
which first appeared, presented, it is true, but a rough sketch : 
but the more creation developed itself, the more you see the 
newly created beings approach this form; at length when 
everything was progressively arranged, so that it might attain 
to its perfection, you see man appear upon the theatre which 
God had embellished for him. 



OF THE WORLD, 



125 



Observe, on the subject of these successive creations, that 
the spiritual sun and natural sun, being always in activity, the 
first by the presence of God who is in the midst of it, and the 
second by the force of expansion which the first communicates 
to it, the spiritual and natural atmospheres are continually in 
effort to preserve and to produce ; for it is by them that the 
substances at rest of the spiritual world, and the fixed substances 
or matter of our world, subsist and are modified. Now, fol- 
low in all its details the formation of the universe, and you 
will be able to have -an idea of the formation of man. 

The creation of the three kinds of spiritual earths which 
are between themselves separate and distinct, according to 
the three degrees, sufficiently indicate to us, that there must 
be in the man-spirit three receptacles in the same manner sepa- 
rate and distinct, that the love and wisdom of God may reach 
him in the three degrees, namely, in the degree of ends, in 
the degree of causes, and in that of spiritual effects, and that 
man may thus be able to dwell upon those earths when he 
departs from our world. 

The receptacle of the love and wisdom of God in the degree 
of ends, is that wdiich constitutes the inmost of the man- spirit. 
It is in this inmost that God resides surrounded with his spiri- 
tual sun ; there is his sanctuary with man. This inmost, form- 
ed of the purest substances at rest, derived from the spiritual 
atmosphere of the third degree, and disposed in the most har- 
monious order, is in reality the third heaven for man ; for it is 
by means of this inmost receptacle that he is adapted, as you 
will see presently, to become an inhabitant of the third heaven, 
or an angel of the inmost heaven. 

The receptacle of the love and wisdom of God in the de- 
gree of causes, is that wdiich constitutes the internal in the 
man-spirit, every part of which envelopes the corresponding 
part of the inmost. This internal, formed from the purest 
substances at rest, drawn from the spiritual atmosphere of the 



1 25 



LETTERS TO A 



second degree, and disposed also in a harmonious order, is 
the second heaven for man; for it is by means of this inter- 
nal receptacle that he can become an angel of the second 
heaven if by his life in the world he has not rendered himself 
fit to be elevated to the inmost heaven. 

Lastly, the receptacle of the love and wisdom of God in the 
degree of spiritual effects, is that which constitutes the interior 
in the man-spirit, all of whose parts also envelope every cor- 
responding part of the internal and of the inmost. This inter- 
ior, formed from the purest substances at rest derived from the 
spiritual atmosphere of the last degree, and disposed likewise 
in a harmonious order, is the first heaven for man ) for it is 
by means of this receptacle that he may become an angel of 
the first heaven, if by his life in the world, he has not ren- 
dered himself fit to be elevated to the superior heavens. 

As to the state of these three receptacles in the material 
body of man, the formation of the material earths demonstrates 
to us that all the parts of each of them are enveloped with fixed 
substances, which are derived from the three natural atmos- 
pheres, and which correspond to the substances at rest of 
which these parts are themselves composed. Such is, in man, 
the Divine order • but the present state of the spiritual world, 
such as I have presented to you in my last letter, demonstrates 
to us again that by his fall man has inverted this order. 

You remember that the fall was progressive and not instan- 
taneous. In the degree that man abandoned goodness and 
truth for the evil and the false, he removed himself from God 
to turn himself more and more towards himself: the love and 
the wisdom of God then experienced an increasing difficulty 
in penetrating into their receptacles, and by degrees there was 
formed in man an inverse order, having its proper receptacle 
for the love of self and self-derived intelligence, or in other 
words for hatred and folly ; and when man had entirely fallen 
into the evil and false, the receptacles of the love and wisdom 



MAN OK THE WORLD. 



127 



of God were completely closed, and those of hatred and folly 
completely open. It is thus that man himself introduced dis- 
order into his primitive organization. Subjected like all other 
beings to the law of transmission by germs, so long as he lived 
according to order, his children were born into the order of cre- 
ation that is to say, good : but as soon as by his life in hatred 
and folly, he had inverted the order to which he had been 
created, his children were born into inverted order, that is to 
say, into evil or into the love of self. 

Nevertheless, although the receptacles of the love and wis- 
dom of God were closed by the fall, God did not the less re- 
side in the inmost of man, for God is in the inmost of every- 
thing ; if it were not thus, man after the fall could not have lived 
either in this or in the spiritual world. But the love and wis- 
dom of God not being able to manifest themselves in the 
man-spirit any farther than their receptacles are opened, man 
would have been forever deprived of that love and wisdom, if 
God, who had foreseen the fall, had not at the same time in 
his mercy provided means for reinstating him. This is not 
the place to examine the means which God employed to re- 
store man to himself; we will speak of this when we come to 
treat concerning points of doctrine. I will only say that by 
these means the receptacles of the love and wisdom of God 
may successively be opened, and thus man can again become 
an inhabitant of the heavens. 

These primary ideas concerning man, being sufficient to en- 
able you to form an idea of spiritual beings, we proceed now 
to extend our investigations to them. 

According to the explications given you in my last letter, the 
spiritual world is composed of two organisms absolutely oppo- 
site, called heaven and hell, and of a mixed organism denomi- 
nated the world of spirits ) then heaven and hell are subdivi- 
ded each into three great parts distinct in themselves, accor- 
ding to the order of degrees, so that there are three heavens 

6* 



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and three hells. Such are the principal divisions which now 
exist in the spiritual world. 

The angels of the inmost or supreme heaven are men who, 
by their life in the world, rendered themselves fit to receive 
the love and wisdom of God in the supreme degree, or degree 
of ends. As the inmost of man is formed of the purest sub- 
stances at rest, derived from the spiritual atmosphere of the 
third degree ; these angels, living then by this inmost alone, 
are in the purest state : surrounded with an atmosphere which 
proceeds immediately from the spiritual sun. they receive 
without any other medium, the influence of this sun. or rather 
influx from God : and consequently spiritual heat, or the divine 
love, and the spiritual light or the divine wisdom, are not tem- 
pered in their manifestations to them except by this atmosphere 
alone. 

Here I will make one observation. You know that God, by 
his spiritual sun, is in every created being, and that it is by 
the heat and light of this sun, that he vivifies all creation : but 
the divine love is so ardent and the divine wisdom so tran- 
scendantly bright, that all spiritual beings would be consumed 
in an instant, if God did not temper this ardor and this bril- 
liancy, by veiling himself more or less by spiritual atmos- 
pheres, in order to proportion his love and wisdom to the state 
of every being. Thus God being always present in the inmost 
of spiritual beings, is never nearer to or more distant from one 
than another ) but he is mere or less veiled, so that the inten- 
sity of spiritual heat and light depends upon the media which 
they traverse before they affect us. The same thing is pro- 
duced in the material world, and the analogy is striking : indeed 
science proves that no being of our globe could support either 
the heat or the light of our sun, even if that luminary were a 
thousand times more remote from us than it really is, if there 
did not exist atmospheric media to temper its heat and light ; 
that without these media all the globes which gravitate around 



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it, would be set on fire and reduced to liquefaction 3 and that 
consequently the intensity of natural heat and light depends 
upon the media which they traverse before arriving at objects,, 
and by no means upon the distance of the sun from those 
objects. 

On the other hand, if among beings of our globe some live in 
the air, others upon the surface of the globe, others in waters, and 
others in the interior of the earth, it is evidently because they 
are not all susceptible of receiving the same intensity of nat- 
ural heat and light ; but, besides this, those which fly in the air 
pass through regions more or less elevated; those which are upon 
the earth, live in climates more or less tempered ; those which 
swim in the seas keep in greater or less depths ; and those which 
conceal themselves in the earth are more or less remote from 
the surface: analogy again shows us then, that in the same 
heaven, angels have mansions which differ from each other, 
as they are adapted to receive, according to continuous degrees, 
more or less love and wisdom. 

The inhabitants of the deepest hell opposite to the highest 
heaven, are, on the contrary, men who in the world have 
lived in the evils and the falses of the third degree or the de- 
gree of ends; the purer the angels of the highest heaven, the 
more impure are those infernal spirits. The inmost inverted 
form, in which they live, is as hideous as that of the third 
heaven is beautiful ; in a word, everything in this hell is the 
opposite of the highest heaven. 

As to the two other heavens and the two other hells which 
are opposite to them, it will be seen also, from the preceding, 
what is the nature of their inhabitants. 

The angels of the second heaven are men who, by their life 
in the world, have only rendered themselves fit to receive the 
love and wisdom of God in the degree of causes ; and the in- 
habitants of the second hell opposite to that of heaven, are 
those who in the world have lived in the evils and falses of 



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this same degree. With the first the internal has been restor- 
ed to order : with the others it has been inverted. 

Lastly, the angels of the first heaven are men who, by their 
life in the world, have only rendered themselves fit to receive 
the love and the wisdom of God in the degree of spiritual ef- 
fects ) and the inhabitants of the first hell opposite to this 
heaven, are those who, in the world, have lived in the evils 
and the falses of this same degree. The interior has been 
restored to order with the first, and it has remained inverted 
with the others. 

The world of spirits is between the first heaven and the 
first hell. It is composed of all those who, on leaving the nat- 
ural world, are not yet good enough to enter into one of the 
heavens, or not yet wicked enough to plunge themselves into 
one of the hells. The first remain there until they are divested 
of the evils and falsities attached to them, and the second until 
they have rejected the little goodness and truth remaining with 
them. 

It was indispensable to enter upon these preliminary details 
before w r e could understand the nature of influx, or the man- 
lev in which life penetrates to the inhabitants of the spiritual 
world, and consequently to men. 

God governs the whole universe by influx. We call that 
common influx which concerns the universe in general, and par- 
ticular influx that which specially concerns the inhabitants of the 
spiritual world and men. There are other kinds of influx, of 
which I will speak to you at another time, but for the present 
we will confine ourselves to the nature of particular influx. 

It is evident that the angel of the supreme heaven receives 
immediately from the spiritual sun the love and wisdom of 
God ; for this angel lives in his inmost principle, and it is in 
this principle that God resides surrounded with his spiritual 
gun. 

But the angels of the second heaven cannot receive imme* • 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



diately, from the spiritual sun, the love and wisdom ol God ; 
for they live in their internal and not in their inmost, or what 
is the same thing, they are in causes and not in ends \ and as 
there is only contiguity between ends and causes, and not con- 
tinuity, the love and the wisdom of God cannot descend from 
ends into causes, but by an influx of angels who are in ends, up- 
on those who are in causes. By means of this influx, the 
angels of the third heaven communicate to the angels of the 
second their affections which proceed from the love of God, and 
their thoughts which proceed from his wisdom ) but these affec- 
tions and thoughts which with the first are relative to ends, be- 
come only relative to causes when the second receive them. 
This results evidently from the degree of life, or of love and 
wisdom in which these last are. 

You have seen that with the angels of the second heaven the 
inmost is closed ) but as every inmost receptacle is from its 
very nature a supreme heaven, since it is formed of the purest 
substances from the spiritual atmosphere of the third degree, 
and since, moreover, heaven is in the angel and in man, though 
it manifests itself out of the angel and man, it results thence 
that the inmost of the angels of the second heaven, closed for 
them, is open for the angels of the highest heaven : this, then 
is the receptacle which serves them for a continent, basis, 
and support, and it is from this that they flow into the internal 
of the angels of the second heaven. 

You will doubtless be much astonished to learn that angels 
having substance and form, are in other angels ; but reflect a 
moment, I pray you, upon the nature of spiritual substances 
and forms ; remove from your thought the idea of space and 
time, and your astonishment will cease. In saying to you repeat- 
edly that God is in man, I made use of no metaphor. God is 
really in the inmost of man, but he is there veiled in his spir- 
itual sun. So the highest heaven is altogether in the inmost of 
man, but it is not veiled there ; yet this inmost being closed 



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with men during their life in the world, and with angels and 
spirits w T ho have not rendered themselves tit to receive the 
love and wisdom of God in the degree of ends, is the reason 
why this supreme heaven is not manifested to their eyes ; but 
if their inmost were opened they w r ould be instantly in this 
heaven, because this heaven is for them included in their in- 
most. So of the rest, of which you will be fully convinced 
when we enter into the details upon the objects of the spirit- 
ual world. Now if all the supreme heaven be in general in 
the inmost of the angel of the second heaven, why be aston- 
ished that angels of this supreme heaven should make in this 
inmost their habitual residence ? Yes, my dear sir, you and I 
have not only God and the supreme heaven in us, but we have 
in us the whole spiritual world ; we have God and the 
supreme heaven in our inmost, and the lowest hell in our 
inverted inmost, the second heaven in our internal, and the 
second hell in our inverted internal, first heaven in our interior, 
and the first hell in our inverted interior * and lastly, the 
whole intermediate world in our man-spirit, such as it is now, 
that is to say, impregnated with terrestrial affections and 
thoughts; and it is because this is the case that it would hap- 
pen, if to morrow we should quit this world, we w r ould be 
there immediately, and without, for that reason, being obliged 
to make any progression of distance or change of place ; w r e 
should be, I say in the midst of the world of spirits, with the same 
affection and thoughts that we now have, and afterwards we 
should go either into one of the heavens or one of the hells, 
according as by our life here below we should have rendered 
ourselves fit to receive in a degree more or less elevated, 
either the love and wisdom of God, or the hatred and folly 
which proceed from the love of self and self-derived intelli- 
gence. But let us return to our discussion. 

If an angel of the highest heaven were not in the inmost of an 
angel of the second heaven, he could not subsist, and the parts 



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of his body would be dissipated like gases which are not com- 
pressed. Indeed, the angel of the supreme heaven, living in 
his inmost receptacle, has successively divested himself of the 
other receptacles which invested his inmost, and consequently 
of the internal receptacle which was its immediate envelope • 
he would not have then any more envelopes to maintain the 
parts ot his body in permanent cohesion, if these receptacles 
were not replaced ; now it is this which happens to the inter- 
nal receptacle, that this angel, as soon as he is divested of his 
internal, resides in the inmost of an angel of the second heaven, 
and as this last angel lives in his internal, this internal serves 
the angel of the supreme heaven for a continent, basis, and 
support. 

It is true that the internal of the angel of the second heaven 
has but little more consistence than the inmost of the angel of 
the supreme heaven, for the only difference which exists be- 
tween these two receptacles is that one is formed from substan- 
ces at rest from the atmosphere of the second degree, and the 
other from substances at rest from the atmosphere of the third 
degree. But observe, that as a consequence of the same law 
the angel of the second heaven has for a residence the interior 
of an angel of the first heaven, which serves him for a conti- 
nent, basis, and support 5 and that the angel of the first heaven 
in like manner resides in a spirit of the intermediate world. 
Yet, although these different receptacles are less and less at- 
tached as to the substances which compose them, they would 
nevertheless, have no consistence and would all be dissipated, 
if they did not repose at last upon a stable basis ; and this solid 
basis is the man whom the spirit of the intermediate world him- 
self has for a continent, basis and support. Thus, according 
to this law of order, it can be explained how spiritual beings 
in certain circumstances, may descend from the superior regiona 
of the spiritual world into inferior regions, and appear even be 
fore men whose spiritual eyes are opened ; we can also under- 



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stand why our soul or man-spirit, in quitting its terrestrial en- 
velope, is not dissipated like a vapor since it finds in the in- 
habitants of our world a receptacle which serves for a continent, 
basis and support. 

If an angel of the supreme heaven cannot subsist without 
being in the inmost of an angel of the second heaven, an angel of 
the second heaven, on the other hand, could not live if he had 
not in his inmost one or more angels of the third heaven : for 
life is composed of affections and thoughts ; and according to 
what precedes, affections and thoughts cannot flow into this 
angel, but by the medium of the angels of the supreme 
heaven. 

I have said that there is in the inmost of this angel, one 01 
more angels of the third heaven; this requires some expla- 
nation. 

The angel of the second heaven, receiving his affections and 
thoughts from the supreme heaven, if his inmost were always 
occupied by a single angel or by the same angels, he himself 
would be an automaton obliged to follow all the impulses 
which are given to him. But each angel, enjoying liberty and 
rationality, which are faculties proper to him, is able to appro- 
priate to himself or reject the affections and thoughts which 
he receives from the angels who are in his inmost. Those 
then from whom proceed the affections and thoughts which he 
rejects, finding themselves no longer in correspondence with 
him, are induced for that very reason to quit him, and others 
succeed who are more in harmony with him. It is thus that 
the angel of the second heaven has really a life proper to 
himself. 

You see from what precedes, that the angels of the third 
heaven are in those of the second, as ends are in causes, or 
rather as causes are in the effects j for in considering the 
second heaven as the effect, the supreme heaven is the cause 
and the spiritual sun is the end, so in considering the supreme 



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135 



heaven as effect, the spiritual sun is the cause and God is the 
end. Now, in like manner, as the cause is out of the effect, 
though being in the effect, so also, the inhabitants of the third 
heaven are out of the inhabitants of the second heaven, though 
in their inmost. 

The inmost of the angels of the second heaven being closed, 
it thence results that in their normal state these angels neither 
see those of the supreme heaven, nor this heaven itself. I say 
in their normal state, for there exist laws of permission, provi- 
ded from all eternity, and appertaining also to order, and accord- 
ing to those laws there can be, in certain cases, a communica- 
tion opened not only between these heavens, but also between 
all parts of the spiritual world, and even between that world 
and ours. It is thus that man in his normal state cannot see 
the spiritual world, and yet that in certain cases his spiritual 
sight can be opened, and then he sees objects and inhabitants 
of this spiritual world. When, then, God permits the inmost 
of the angels of the second heaven to be opened, they are ac- 
tually in communication with the angels of the supreme hea- 
ven 3 but without this permission, no other communication exists 
between them than by particular influx, and according to cor- 
respondences. 

What I have just said concerning the second heaven in rela- 
tion to the third, is applicable to the first in relation to the sec- 
ond. 1 will only add that the affections and thoughts which 
the angels of the superior heavens transmit, although they are 
inmost and internal, or relate to ends and causes, are trans- 
formed into affections and thoughts of the first degree, or having 
relation to spiritual effects, when they are received by the an- 
gels of the first heaven. 

Particular influx is transmitted afterwards according to the 
same laws to the world of spirits. Those who sojourn in this 
world are destined to inhabit either one of the heavens or one 
of the hells, according as they have rendered themselves fit dur- 



dig their life upon earth to receive or reject the love and wisdom 
of God in their different degrees. But as they are still full of 
terrestrial affections and thoughts — though they are disengaged 
from their material body — their inmost, their internal and 
their interior cannot be completely opened, whether for the 
life of heaven, or the life of hell, until after they have reject- 
ed these affections and thoughts. They live in this interme- 
diate world, both by the influx which they receive from the hea- 
vens, and by the contrary influx, which comes to them from the 
hells, influx of which I am now about to speak. 

You have already seen that man. by his fall, had destroyed 
in himself the order of creation, and that by the change of the 
love of God into self-love, or into hatred against others, and 
by that of the wisdom of God into self-derived intelligence or 
folly, he had formed in himself an inverted order, which had 
its receptacles for the three degrees of hatred and folly, or evil 
and the false. You have also seen that thence had resulted 
three hells opposite to the three heavens, the deepest hell 
consisting in inmost hatreds and follies, or what relates to 
ends, the second hell in internal hatreds and follies, or what 
relates to causes, and the first hell in interior hatreds and fol- 
lies, or what relates to spiritual effects. From the deepest 
hell then there proceeds also by reaction an influx: but this 
influx operating upon the two other hells and upon the world 
of spirits, in a sense inverse of the influx of the supreme 
heaven upon the two other heavens, and upon this world of 
spirits, I believe it to be useless to enter again into all the de- 
tails which I have given you. You will, besides, readily ac- 
knowledge that with the spirits of the intermediate world, 
their inmost inverted includes demons of the deepest hell, 
their inverted internal demons of the second hell, and their in- 
verted interior demons of the first hell. You will acknowledge 
also with the same facility that the inhabitant of the deepest hell 
has for continent, basis, and support the inverted inmost of 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



137 



the inhabitant of the second hell ; that of the second hell the 
inverted internal of the inhabitant of the first hell \ and that 
of the first hell the inverted interior of the inhabitant of the 
world of spirits ; if, however, this presents some difficulty to 
you by reason of the inverted position which the hells present, 
it will suffice for you to compare this position to that of the 
antipodes, and analogy will at once remove the difficulty. 

By the effect of these two kinds of opposite influx, the in- 
habitants of the heavens and those of the hells have for conti- 
nent, basis, and support those of the intermediate world ) but 
this basis being, like the preceding, of a spiritual nature, 
would still present no consistence, and all would be dissipated 
and vanish away, angels, devils, and spirits, if it did not rest 
upon a solid basis. This last basis which completes the edi- 
fice is man by means of his material body. In man are good 
and bad spirits who transmit to him good and bad affections, 
pure and impure thoughts; and as spirits include in them- 
selves angels and devils, these angels and these devils are also 
with man in the different receptacles which his man-spirit 
contains. Without the affections and thoughts which are 
transmitted to him from the spiritual world, and which are 
changed when he receives them into natural affections and 
thoughts, man could not live, for the life of man consists in 
affections and thoughts : but in order that man may be man, 
and not an automaton, he has received free will and rationality 
as his own, and it is by these two faculties that he appropriates 
or rejects the affections and thoughts which come to him from 
the spiritual world by the two influxes. On the other hand, 
without man spiritual beings could not subsist, since it is ne- 
cessary that they should have for a support a solid and stable 
basis to contain them. 

These general considerations concerning particular influx 
will raise numerous questions which I will treat of successive- 
ly in other letters ; however, I will not conclude this, though 



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it is already too long, without drawing from this discussion a 
consequence which may not have escaped you. but which 
nevertheless demands from its importance some explication. 

Since the spiritual world would not exist nor subsist without 
the natural world, it results thence that if this were destroyedj 
its destruction would necessarily draw with it that of the other, 
so that of all that has been created there would remain abso- 
lutely nothing. 

Those who have hitherto admitted and preached the erron- 
eous doctrine of the end of the world, have been believed, even 
by persons who made use of their understandings, because they 
were in complete ignorance of this strict connection which exists 
between the two worlds, by which the one cannot subsist with- 
out the other. The end of the world in their idea presented 
only the destruction of the material part of the universe, the 
spiritual part, by that catastrophe, not ceasing to subsist. 
But when the inmost connection, which, makes the two worlds 
one coherent whole, is known, it is impossible to admit the 
complete destruction of the material universe, since God could 
not destroy it without at the same time destroying the spirit- 
ual universe. That God should destroy one part cf that 
which he has made for the preservation and amelioration of 
the other part, this, I repeat it, may be conceived : but that 
he should destroy all that he has made, without any vestige 
remaining, this cannot be admitted, without charging God 
with improvidence and folly. 

Besides, in order to destroy the material universe, would it 
not be necessary that God should employ means the reverse of 
those he has made use of in creating it ? How, in fact, would 
these masses which gravitate in space be made to disappear ? 
Would he launch them into chaos 1 But we have seen that 
chaos, such at least as it is commonly conceived, is but a 
word without meaning, and never could have existed. It 
would be necesary then that the material universe should di$- 



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appear, or in other words, it would be necessary that it should 
be, after its dissolution, what it was before its construction; if 
not, matter would always exist, though under another form. 
Then this would not be what is commonly understood by the 
end of the world • it would be a change of form, a general 
ruin in which the human race would disappear, but it would 
not be the annihilation of matter. Now where was the uni- 
verse before its creation ? As we have seen by our preceding 
remarks, it was in the bosom of God. And what was matter 
before it possessed the forms it now presents % We have also 
acknowledged, and modern science proves it, that it was com- 
posed only of aeriform fluids. It would be necessary then that 
the emanation which, in proceeding from God, has taken forms 
so varied, in order to constitute by a succession of long periods 
this vast and beautiful universe, it would be necessary, I say, 
that this emanation should return to its first state, by follow- 
ing an inverse course, and thus return into the bosom of God 
without external manifestation. Then God would have labored 
in vain, and all his work would be to do over again. Can such 
a supposition for a.moment be admitted % 

There remains one objection; many persons will no doubt 
say : How can the spiritual world contain the millions of souls 
which each of the millions of terrestrial globes transmits to it 
every day, if this daily transmission is to continue eternally, 
especially when it is admitted that souls are spiritual sub- 
stances and forms % How provide for so many spiritual bodies % 
This objection, it is true, has nothing serious in it, and you 
doubtless would not make it ; but I have referred to it because 
it has often been presented to me by men who have given 
proofs of intelligence, and were endowed with good judgment. 

If we would reflect a moment upon the nature of what is 
spiritual, which cannot in any manner be subject to the laws 
of space, we would be very far from making snch an objec- 
lion ; but accustomed as we are to live in space and time, and 



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to refer everything to space and time, our first ideas always will 
partake of the impressions which we receive from them ; it is 
not astonishing that a similar objection should present itself to 
our minds as soon as we speak of such an immensity of spirit- 
ual beings. But when we abstract from our minds the idea of 
space and time, it is easy to understand that the spiritual world) 
though contained in the natural world, could contain not only all 
the souls which the terrestrial globes will send to it to eternity, 
but a much greater number, if it were possible, without its in- 
habitants being crowded. To see that, it is sufficient to recollect 
that the spiritual world is contained in the natural world.as the 
cause is contained in the effect, and that the spiritual not being 
subjected to the trammels of space, each one of the parts of 
the other world is always susceptible of taking all the devel- 
opment which is necessary to it, without this development 
being for that reason prejudicial to the other parts, under the 
relation of the appearances of space which is enjoyed in the 
spiritual world. To the considerations which I have just pre- 
sented to you in favor of the indestructibility of the material 
universe, I could add many others \ but this, I believe, would 
be useless ) for the more we advance in the examinations of 
spiritual things, the more you will acknowledge the intimate 
connection which renders the two worlds indispensable to 
each other. Besides, how much sweet consolation does the 
thought, that the material universe will subsist forever, pres- 
ent ! What a beneficent impulse would it not produce if it 
were generally admitted ! And yet it is engraved upon the 
heart of man. Consult it, and an interior voice will respond 
that God has not created this universe to destroy it. What } 
could God be amused in creating a world to destroy it as a 
child does with a house of cards ! No, God is not reckless — 
he is not capricious. He is love itself, and wisdom itself. 
The universe was derived from his love, and it was by his wis- 
dom that he created it in accordance with the laws of that 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



141 



wisdom, that is to say, the laws of divine order. But according 
to these laws, man, for whom it was created, was endowed with 
free will, without which he would have been nothing more than 
an automaton ) he has made a bad use of this precious faculty, 
and has become altogether degenerate. The degradation of hu- 
manity has produced disorder in the spiritual world, as we have 
seen ) and the natural w r orld, which is subject to the spiritual 
world, according to the laws of correspondence, has undergone 
an analogous alteration. This is the real cause of the state which 
the world we inhabit now presents. But God, in his infinite 
wisdom, had foreseen this fall of man, and had, in his boundless 
love, provided means to save by reinstating him. It is by this 
renovation of man in particular, that the renovation of men in 
general will take place, and that our world will gradually arrive 
at the state of splendor to which it was destined. It is now 
arising from a long and sad descending series of ages, to enter 
upon a beautiful and glorious period which shall never end ! 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER XL 

You are anxious, my dear sir, to know in its details, this 
spiritual world, the generalities of which we have just been 
investigating. This anxiety gives me pleasure, and I would 
wish to satisfy it at once, for I am desirous to explain what is 
the existence of man, when, on leaving this earth, he enters 
the world of spirits; but the very nature of our discussion re* 
quires us to proceed by degrees. Truths can only be well 
comprehended so far as those upon which they are supported 
have been at first developed and then admitted. There re- 
main, it is true, but very few truths to present to you that you 

7 



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may be placed in a state to comprehend the existence of man 
after death ; but still it is indispensable that you should know 
them and admit them. 

That which I am now going to establish may at first excite 
your astonishment, but the least reflection will induce you 
soon to acknowledge, that it is the consequence of those which 
you have already adopted. It is this : 

Every general division of the spiritual world has the human 
form, and the spiritual world in the whole presents also this 
form. 

You have acknowledged that Gocl is Very Man (or V Homme- 
Type), and you have seen by our preceding remarks that all 
that which exists here below tends to reproduce, by insensible 
shadowings, the forms of the primitive type. If it is thus in 
our world, with much stronger reason should it be the same 
in the spiritual world, where life resides free from the obstruc- 
tions of matter. Besides, since the spiritual world is the emana - 
tion of God, and as no object can really exist without having a 
form, what other form could this world have but the form of 
the principle from which it proceeds. 

Let us at first examine it in its general divisions. 

When I explained the creation, in a preceding letter, I made 
use of the word " sphere, ' J because it is that which is usually 
employed in treating of emanations ; but I did not intend to be 
understood by this that the emanations proceeding from God- 
Man formed spheres according to the strict construction of the 
word, such as those which would result from a body composed 
of homogeneous parts, and having itself a form perfectly spheri- 
cal. The form which emanations must take, when no foreign 
cause opposes, is evidently that of the principle itself. The 
three spiritual atmospheres that have constituted the three 
heavens, being emanations from God-Man, have been devel- 
oped then according to the form of their principle. Thus the 
supreme heaven, constituted of the spiritual atmosphere of the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



143 



third degree, has the form of a man ; and it is under this form 
that it is presented in the complex to the eyes of the divinity. 
The second heaven, constituted of the spiritual atmosphere 
of the second degree, has also the human form; and as it en- 
velopes, in every sense, the supreme heaven, it is under this 
form that it is presented in the whole, to the eyes of God and 
to the angels of the supreme heaven. It is the same with the 
first heaven, constituted of the spiritual atmosphere of the first 
degree — it having the form of man \ and as it envelopes, in 
every sense, the second heaven, it is under this form that it 
presents itself, in the whole, to the eyes of God and angels of 
the superior heavens. The three heavens, having thus the 
human form \ being from their very nature one within another j 
and having God for the common centre, the whole of them to- 
gether present, in the sight of God, the form of one single man. 
The first heaven is the exterior of this spiritual organism, the 
second heaven is its internal, and the supreme heaven is its 
inmost. 

But you have seen that through the work of man, there was 
formed, in opposition to the spiritual organism, an inverted or- 
ganism, which is called hell. Seen in the whole together, 
each one of the three hells presents also the form of man ; but 
this form, instead of being that of man created in the image 
and likeness of God, is that of a man-monster. These three 
hells, united in like manner, present themselves under the 
form of one single human monster : the first hell is the exter- 
ior of this organism, the second hell is its internal, and the 
deepest hell is its inmost. 

The world of spirits being a mixed spiritual organism pre- 
sents, in the whole of it together, a form which is intermedi- 
ate betweeen the true human form and the form of a human 
monster. 

I will not insist further upon these truths ; it will be very 
easy for you to perceive the strict results of the principles 



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which I have previously unfolded. Still I ought, before we 
proceed further, to anticipate an objection which presents 
itself, and which would not escape your notice. 

"The spiritual world,' ' you might say, "being in the nat- 
ural world, as the cause is in the effect, and having given to 
this world the form which it presents to us, since matter has 
not of itself any form, it results from this that if the spiritual 
universe has the human form, the material universe also should 
have this form. Now I do not think that such a position can 
be sustained. Do we not know that the earth which we in- 
habit is a spheroid ? The principal laws which govern our 
planetary system are now known. We know that the planets 
gravitate around the sun, travelling in orbits whose tracts are 
determined; that every satellite gravitates around its planet ) 
and analogy is there which indicates that it must be the same 
in the other solar systems. How, in the presence of these ac- 
quired knowledges, can it be demonstrated that the material 
universe has the human form % It seems to me that there is 
here an absolute impossibility. It is in vain for me to seek this 
form in the whole of our universe ; I should see nothing which 
could make an approach to it." This I believe is the objec- 
tion in all its force. 

Swedenborg, whose sublime theories I am simply developing 
in my letters, does not, it is true explain himself upon the form 
of the material universe : yet his theories, conducting us to the 
consequence which forms the subject of the objection, I proceed 
to examine if it is really impossible, since it seems at the first 
approach, that the material universe should have the form and 
the constitution of the human body. 

To any one possessing a knowledge of astronomy it is evi- 
dent, that notwithstanding its 25,000 miles of circumference, 
our globe is yet but a single point in space. The orbit even of 
the earth, which is more than 630 millions of miles, is still but 
a point relatively to the immensity of the universe ; indeed, if 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



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the stars seem to us altogether immovable daring the course of 
the year, though they should from the motion of the earth 
answer to different positions in the vault of heaven, it is evi- 
dently because our globe, notwithstanding the 630 millions of 
miles it passes over in space, is in respect to them as if it had 
no motion. But further, the whole of our solar system, of 
which the orbit alone of Uranus has 12.000,000,000 miles, oc- 
cupies but an almost imperceptible part of the universe, when 
we compare this universe to the body of man. This is not a 
paradox ; it is a truth which the telescope has so well reveal- 
ed that no one can doubt it. A simple survey of the universe, 
such as modern astronomy presents it, goes to convince us of 
this at once. 

Antiquity, that part at least of which there remains any his- 
torical monument counted but twenty two thousand fixed stars. 
But as soon as the telescope was discovered an innumerable 
multitude of stars, till then invisible, were presented to the as- 
tonished view of observers. The Abbe De la Caille, in one 
third of the arch of heaven, counted ten thousand of which he 
gave a catalogue, which would be supposing thirty thousand 
for the entire vault. The theory of nebulse afterwards came 
to increase the number considerably ; then the telescope being 
more and more improved, in a single band of the milky way, 
of an extent of fifteen degrees in length by two in breadth, 
Herschell counted fifty thousand ; finally this celebrated as- 
tronomer presumes the number of stars might amount to 
seventy-five millions. 

Behold then already seventy-five millions of solar systems, 
of which ours is perhaps but one of the least extent ) but ad- 
mitting for it a proportional mean, still it would constitute 
but the seventy-five millionth part of the universe • now, I ask 
you if the seventy-five millionth part of the body of man 
would not be even by this estimate almost imperceptible 1 

But who would dare to say that there are but seventy-fiva 



146 



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millions of suns spread throughout space, when the interval 
which separates the stars from us is of such immensity that it 
even frightens the imagination % Huygen found the distance 
between us and the nearest of the stars was 2,885.045.634,600 
of miles. Other astronomers have carried their investigations 
to particular stars; that which Lalande observed was at 
20,315,310.000,000 miles; that of Baily 21,482,718,240,000 
that of Euler at near 42,000,000,000 of miles. This learned 
man, in a letter to a princess of Germany, has calculated that 
a ray of light from this star would take six years notwithstand- 
ing its incredible velocity, to reach our earth. If it were pos- 
sible that a cannon ball projected from that celestial body 
could be transmitted to us, five millions four hundred thou • 
sand years would elapse before it could reach us. Another 
star which was observed by Lambert was more than 51,000,000 
000,000 of miles; finally Doctor Derham, canon of Windsor, who 
observed the nebulae, in 1732, acknowldged that they were as 
far from the fixed stars as these stars are from our globe. 

If from the 30,000 stars of the Abbe de la Caille, we have 
reached by the improvement of the telescopy to the 75.000,000 
of Herschell, at what number does not so immense extent allow 
us to suppose we may arrive by means of new improvements ? 
And if an instrument should be discovered, which would be to 
the telescope what the telescope is to the naked eye, instead of 
millions we w r ould have to count by the thousand of millions, 
the suns which enlighten the universe. We may then with- 
out fearing to be taxed with exaggeration, assert that in com- 
paring the material universe to the body of man, our solar sys- 
tem would form but an almost imperceptible part. 

What do we conclude from this ? It is that if we continue 
to compare the universe to the body of man we are forced to 
acknowledge that all the motions of the globes which gravitate 
around our sun, motions which appear to us so magnificent, 
cannot even be discerned any longer. Then all these masses 



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not only must no longer appear to change position, but they 
must again be confounded with their common centre, and seem 
to make with it but one body scarcely visible, 

In presence of all these facts revealed by the telescope, what 
becomes of the argument drawn from the gravitation of the 
planets and their satellites % But is it not astonishing that men 
should exclaim against the first idea of the universe under a 
human form : has it not a long time appeared incredible that 
the earth is round % What w r ould a philosopher of the middle 
ages have thought, if this truth, which is now incontestable, 
had been advanced to him ? What again would a Swiss cot- 
tager think, should any one tell him that the earth is like an 
orange, and that its surface presents no more inequalities than 
that fruit, when that peasant would have but to raise his eyes 
to see himself surrounded by mountains in the form of spires, 
and contemplate the gigantic Mount Blanc % Let us beware 
of judging from appearances \ the experience of the past is suf- 
ficient to prove that they are deceitful ; let us, on this point, be 
more circumspect than our predecessors were. 

I have just compared the material universe to the body of 
man, and I have proved mathematically that in the hypothesis 
of the universe under a human form, our whole solar sys- 
tem, however vast it may be, and however magnificent the 
motions of its planets may appear, would nevertheless cor- 
respond only to an almost imperceptible part of the body of 
man. 

I now proceed to show that in the almost imperceptible parts 
of the body of man, there are motions analogous to those, 
which are performed in the corresponding solar systems. This 
second proposition appears at least as extraordinary as the first; 
but from what we. have just seen, what learned man would 
venture to deny it % If the telescope has made such fine dis- 
coveries in the fields of space indefinitely great, the microscope 
yields nothing to it on this point, and every day new wonders 



LETTERS TO A 



are discovered by it in the no less surprising field of space in* 
definitely small. 

It is generally acknowledged that porosity is a quality inher- 
ent in matter ; thus all bodies without exception are porous. 
Now, if there are interstices between the different molecules 
of a body, how many must there not exist before we come to 
the parts which are invisible with the best microscopes'* And 
when we reflect on the extreme minuteness of these parts, 
what intervals relatively immense must there not be between 
them ! From this we may conceive that all that which we 
have said on the subject of the indefinitely great is equally ap- 
plicable to the indefinitely least of things ; for the distances 
which separate the objects of the one are proportional to the 
distances which separate the objects of the other. 

If you were not already acquainted with the wonderful 
things which are discovered by the microscope, in the domain 
of the indefinitely least of things, I would have drawn a sketch 
of it to support my position : recall, then, to your memory the 
principal microscopic experiences, and my proposition will 
cease to appear extraordinary to you. 

A physician, who is doubtless far from knowing the wri- 
tings of Swedenborg, has published, upon the orbitary motion 
of atoms, a theory which must confirm in some measure that 
which I present to you. M. Gaudin, in fact, supposes that the 
atoms of bodies, maintained at distances very great in propor- 
tion to their dimensions, perform around one another motions 
analogous to those of a planetary system. 

Imperfect as the microscope may yet be, if we should suc- 
ceed in verifying the theory of M. Gaudin, we should doubtless 
find analogy between the motions of what he calls the atoms 
of bodies and those of a planetary system ; but if afterwards 
the investigations were applied to the particles of the human 
body we should find there something more than analogy] we 
shouk find that there is similitude. I will state upon what 



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ground this conclusion is based : all the objects of nature tend, 
as I have already said, more or less to re-produce the human 
form, which is that of the Creator • it would be then confor- 
mable to our principles that there should be found some anal- 
ogy between the motions of the particles of bodies and that 
of the planetary system ; but as it is man alone who has the 
form of God, if the material universe, as I suppose, has been 
created according to this form, it is only in particles of the 
human body that we could recognize a perfect similitude be» 
tween their arbitrary motions and those of the solar systems. 

I have spoken of the theory of M. Gaudin to show that sci- 
ence itself is beginning to enter upon a way which may lead 
to great discoveries. Science has been for a long time embar- 
rassed with a crowd of systems which clash with and destroy 
each other ; it knows that there can be but one which is true, 
and that true system will be that which will be distinguished 
from others by its extreme simplicity, great economy, and its 
universality. The less wheel- work a machine has the better 
does it perform its functions. 

The objection which I have anticipated has already con- 
ducted us very far ; but since the question of the material uni- 
verse under a human form has been raised, we will continue 
the discussion. As everything must tend to unity, and as 
every fixed star is a sun around which a system of planets 
gravitates, certain astronomers have been led to believe that 
there exists a central sun, round which all the other suns also 
gravitate. What are we to think of this sun % does it really 
exist % 

On the first view, the existence of such a central sun appears 
probable enough ; it seems even to accord perfectly with the 
spiritual theory which. I have developed to you ; indeed, since 
there -is one spiritual sun, the centre of the whole immaterial 
universe, should there not be also a natural sun for the centre 
of the whole material universe ? However strong these prob- 



150 



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abilities may be, you will soon acknowledge that they disap- 
pear before a profound examination. 

The astronomers who are led to believe that there exists a 
central sun. base their reasoning upon the analogy of the planets 
to satellites. Since, they say, planets revolve round the sun, 
drawing with them their satellites, why should not each sun 
revolve round a central sun drawing with it, in like manner 
all the globes which constitute its system ? 

In the first place there is not here complete analogy. In 
fact, the planets and the satellites are of the same nature, since 
they are both earths, and they differ from their sun m this, 
that the sun is a globe of fire ; they are then similar bodies 
w T hich revolve round a dissimilar body, to receive from it heat 
and light. It is not the same when we suppose solar systems 
revolving round a central sun; the suns are not of the same 
nature with the globes which they w T ould draw with them, and 
besides, they would not differ from the central star around 
which they would revolve : for we could not conceive of this 
central star being any thing else than a vast globe of fire to 
feed the other suns, which also are globes of fire. But if we 
supposed this sun of a superior nature to that of the other suns, 
we should run a very great risk of making it the principle of 
all nature, and of falling into materialism. 

Next we see clearly that the sun of every system is indis- 
pensable to the globes which revolve around it, since it trans- 
mits to them the heat and light which are necessary to them ; 
but we do not see so well of what use it would be to the mil- 
lions of suns to depend upon a central sun. 

The learned, unable to conceive how the universe could be 
sustained, desire to extricate themselves from their embar- 
rassment, by uniting through the laws of gravitation all these 
suns to a common centre : but with this additional wheel-work, 
will they succeed in diminishing the difficulty ? Will they 
conceive any better how this central globe is itself sustained 1 



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Besides, what would become of the material universe on such 
an hypothesis ? Would it not be a whole composed of parts 
nearly similar % for this universe in the whole would present 
but the repetition of that which it possesses in its parts \ now 
we know that the perfection of an unity, consists in the diver- 
sity, and above all in the beautiful harmony, of all its parts. 
You will soon acknowledge that this new wheel work would 
have been more destructive than useful to the harmonic unity 
of our universe. 

As to the probability of the existence of this central sun, 
by reason of the existence of one only spiritual sun, it will not 
bear an examination. What is spiritual, not being from its 
very nature subject to space and time, the spiritual sun is sus- 
ceptible of being seen by all the inhabitants of the other world, 
If it is not visible, if it is more or less veiled, or entirely ob- 
scured to a great number, this proceeds only from the dispo- 
sition of their interiors. It would be necessary, then, accord- 
ing to the laws of analogy, that the central material body, if 
there existed one, should be universally seen, and clearly dis- 
tinguished among the other suns \ and the single fact that we are 
unable to distinguish such a body throughout the whole vault of 
heaven, would be at once a strong presumption against its exis- 
tence. Besides, from the prodigious number of suns intersper- 
sed through space, the first notions of astronomy teach us that 
for a central body to be invisible to all the globes of the universe, 
and to be clearly distinguished among the other suns, it must 
necessarily be so large as to have no proportion between its 
mass and the laws of gravitation. But further, as the proba- 
bility in question is supported from the analogy which should 
exist between the two universes, it will necessarily be destroyed 
if it is found to be in opposition to the strict analogical conse- 
quences, which we have already established. Now I have 
shown in the beginning of this letter, that the spiritual uni- 
verse had the form of man, whence resulted, according to the 



Ih2 



LETTERS TO A 



relations which exist between the two worlds, that the material 
universe should also have this form. Nevertheless, this propo- 
sition appeared so strange, that I have been compelled to sup- 
port it by facts : and those which I have drawn from astronomy- 
have shown you that nothing is opposed to the idea that the 
material universe has the human form. If then our universe 
has the human form, it is evident that it could not have a 
central sun, unless there was in the human body a central 
organ around which all the others should gravitate. Now it is 
in vain to seek to discover such an organ in the body of man ; 
it is very certain that it has no existence there. 

The probabilities in favor of a central sun for the universe 
being thus destroyed, I must now show you that this great 
number of natural suns for one only spiritual sun, does not 
really constitute a defect of analogy between the two uni- 
verses. 

Observe that the spiritual world, having the human form, is 
composed of regions innumerable, and in themselves distinct, 
as are all the parts of the human body ) that these regions 
are all inhabited by societies which present among themselves 
very sensible differences ; that those, for example, which oc- 
cupy some parts of the feet or the hands of the Grand Man, 
differ much from those which are in the parts of the head, or 
of one of the viscera of the breast ) that these differences result 
from the disposition of the interiors of those who compose 
these societies ; that the spiritual sun does not shine with the 
same force to the eyes of all these societies, since the exis- 
tence of every one of them depends upon a special degree of 
spiritual heat and light, the same as in our world the existence 
of the inhabitants of each planet depends upon a special de- 
gree of natural heat and light 5 and that thus the spiritual 
sun is always more or less veiled, and must appear to one 
society different from that which it appears to another. Now 
as every solar system of our universe corresponds to one of the 



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parts of the spiritual universe, every natural sun corresponds 
to one of these apparent differences of the spiritual sun ; there 
is actually then no defect of analogy. Thus our sun is the 
correspondent of the sun of life for the very small part of the 
material universe which gravitates around it. If there exis- 
ted a central sun, we could uot comprehend how ours could be 
the immediate correspondent of the spiritual sun. 

There is again, under the relation of analogy, an objection 
which you might make ; it is that the human form belongs, 
as I have established at the beginning of this letter, not only 
to the whole of the spiritual world, but further, to each one 
of these general divisions, whilst in the natural world there 
is seen nothing, in this respect, of analogy. I have but one 
simple observation to make upon this subject : The general di- 
vision of the spiritual world is quite peculiar to that world ; for 
ours, in consequence of the properties of matter, cannot present 
a resemblance. It is sufficient to convince you of this, to re- 
member what has been said, that the two universes, the spirit- 
ual and the natural, were constituted by atmospheres, and that 
the three spiritual atmospheres formed immaterial earths dis- 
tinct among themselves, according to the three separate de- 
grees, whilst the natural atmospheres contributed all three to 
form the one the inmost, the other the interior, aud the last 
the ultimate of the material earths. [Letter 9.] 

I would make, besides, one important remark ) it is, that be- 
tween our system and that which admits a central sun and 
thus gives to the universe a spherical form, there is, under the 
relation of the harmony of parts, thefsame difference as between 
the beautiful structure of the human body, and that of a round 
body. 

I have sought, in the examination of this question, to antici- 
pate the objections which you might make ; if others should 
present themselves to your mind, be pleased to communicate 
tnem. 



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Now, let us take a view of the advantages which the system 
of the universe under a human form can present to tbe philo- 
sophical Christian. 

Since the laws of attraction and gravitation have been 
known, men have vainly sought to discover the cause of these 
laws. Deists, upon this point, have not been more happy 
than materialists, for in considering, with the materialist, the 
material universe under a spherical form, it became impossi- 
ble suitably to explain the relations which exist between God, 
the universe, and man. What exact relations could they find 
between their God, who has neither substance nor form, their 
universe under the form of a ball, and man whose structure is 
so different ? But when it is recognized, as it is by us, that 
God is Man Himself, or Very Man, and the universe is admit- 
ted to be in the human form, all is united, everything is con- 
nected in a manner as simple as it is admirable, and the 
structure of the material universe, being like that of the body 
of man, the knowledge of our body may conduct us to that of 
the universe. 

Why indeed does your body, composed of material ele- 
ments, move, though from its very nature matter is inert % 
You have already acknowledged, that it is because there is in 
you a spiritual man which gives it motion. Well, it is the 
same with the great material man, or the natural universe — 
it receives its motion from the grand immaterial Man, or the 
spiritual universe. As to your spiritual man and the grand 
immaterial Man, though you have concerning them as yet but 
indistinct ideas, you however know that they derive the form 
they have from God-man, and from this alone you may see 
with what harmonious simplicity, and with what admirable 
economy of means, the Divine Architect has constructed and 
sustains all that which exists ) but farther on, you will find in the 
explications which I will give you concerning the man-spirit 
and the spiritual world, new motives of admiration and new 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



15,1 



means of confirmation. However, I ought even now to ob- 
serve, tliat if I call the universe the Grand Man, it is not that 
it is properly speaking a man, that is to say, a being endow r ed 
with will and understanding, it is only an immense organism, 
all the parts of which, disposed according to the body of man 
have been destined to be the representative theatres of the glory 
of God, serving for the habitation of men, who alone are com- 
pletely created in the image and according to the likeness of 
the Divinity. I make this observation, because certain philos- 
ophers still pretend that the universe is a being endowed 
with intelligence. 

I might here conclude this discussion ) however, as I ought 
to neglect nothing in so grave a subject, I will examine yet 
one question which may occur to you ; but this will only be to 
prove to you how useless it is for a man to employ his medita- 
tions about things, which it will never be given to him to com- 
prehend. This question is : u The universe having the form 
of man, what existence is there out of that form?' 7 In ad- 
vance, I must make one remark , viz : that this question does 
not concern only the universe under a human form ) but that it 
may quite as well be addressed to those who represent it to 
themselves under a spherical form. But whether the universe 
has the form of a man or that of a sphere, there will always be 
the same difficulty in conceiving it in all its extension, and this 
difficulty arises from the fact, that our thoughts are continually 
influenced by ideas of space, because living in the material world 
we are unable to make a complete abstraction from space, which 
is an accident inherent in matter. Men usually reason concern- 
ing the infinite as if they could comprehend it, and yet it is im- 
possible to have the least idea of it; in the spiritual world, where 
there is only the appearance of space, it is possible to form 
some idea of it ) but to comprehend the infinite, it is necessa- 
ry to be infinite, that is to say, God. Between the infinite 
and the finite there cannot be any relations, and the word in- 



156 



LETTERS TO A 



finite should never be employed but in speaking of God and 
his attributes. 

It cannot then be pretended that the universe is infinite, for 
this would be making it God, but we may say that it is inde- 
finite. In fact between the indefinite and the infinite there is 
this difference, that the indefinite is extended as far as our 
imagination can go, while the infinite admits neither the idea 
of the greatest nor of the least; and besides, though the inde- 
finite cannot be expressed by a number, nevertheless, relative- 
ly to the infinite, it is itself finite, and so finite that there 
cannot exist between the two any relation. 

Though the material universe has a form, yet as this uni- 
verse is indefinite, it results thence that space is indefinitely 
extended; now, to ask, what exists out of the form of the uni- 
verse ? is in other words to ask, what exists out of space ? — an 
idle question, as the terms which we are obliged to make use 
of to form it sufficiently indicate. Out of, is in fact an ex- 
pression which belongs in an absolute manner to space, and 
has no meaning when separate from the idea of space. Re- 
flect a moment on the idea which the expression out of excites 
in you, when you ask yourself : what exists out of the universe ? 
and you w T ill admit at once that you are then under the im- 
pression of an idea of space. All that you could suppose then 
to be out of the universe would be still in space, and would still 
be. part of the grand material man, or our universe. It is in 
vain to seek abstraction from space, whether in saying out of the 
universe, or by employing any other words of this kind ; we 
always remain fixed to space not only by the employment of 
expressions, but by the thought which is itself composed 
only of ideas of space. Should not this very evident impossi- 
bility dissuade men from occupying themselves with questions 
which are above human intelligence ? 

These considerations upon space apply also to time F When 
I said to you in my last letter that the material world would 



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157 



subsist always, I did not mean that it would be eternal, AU 
ways is not eternity. We cannot here below, enveloped as 
we are by time, have any idea of eternity ; in the spiritual 
world, where there is but the appearance of space and time, 
spiritual beings can form some idea of it ; but the Eternal 
Himself can only comprehend eternity. Multiply ages by 
ages as long as you please, you never will obtain eternity, be- 
cause you will remain in time without ever going out of it, 
and you will thus have behind you a past, and before you a fu- 
ture. Alvjays, or the indefinite of time, differs from eternity in 
this that always extends itself as far as the imagination can 
carry the succession of time, with the unavoidable idea of the 
past and the future, whilst eternity admits neither the idea of 
the past nor the future. Man is destined to live always, be- 
cause he is immortal ; but immortality is not eternity; for if 
man in the spiritual world is no longer in time, he is in the 
appearance of time, and consequently in that of the past and 
future. God alone has the past and future in the present, be- 
cause he alone is Eternal. 

All this is because the indefinite is the image of the infinite, 
and because the infinite is in God, and indefinites are in the 
spiritual sun, whence proceed the two universes. 

To resume, T see not, my dear sir, any impossibility in the 
material universe having the human form. The more I reflect 
upon this question, the more it seems to me that this form is 
that which accords best with our theories as a whole, and pre- 
sents at once the greatest simplicity and the most beautiful 
harmony. 

The old theology is affrighted at the discoveries of science ; 
it persecuted Galileo, aad, if it could, would again prevent the 
soaring of the human mind ; but true theology, far from wish- 
ing to restrain the intelligence of man, would rather encourage 
its development. The more the telescope shall multiply worlds 
to our eyes, the more the microscope shall expose to our won- 



158 



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dering gaze the marvellous structure of the human body, the 
more will men be brought to acknowledge the sublime truths 
of Christianity. 

But why do those who cultivate the sciences make so little 
progress in them, notwithstanding their ardor in the pursuit \ 
Why are they always groping, and incessantly turning in a 
circle, instead of advancing in a straight line 1 It is because 
they want a fixed basis ; it is because they have no criterium. 
The learned may in general be divided into two classes 3 in the 
first are those who by means of a system which they have built 
up themselves, or which they have modified, claim to be lead- 
ers of sects ) these so identify themselves with their system, 
that it would be like committing suicide to abandon it. The 
second class is that of the more modest learned, who seek 
truth and attach themselves to some system in the hope of 
finding it ; these would become much more useful to the 
sciences if they studied Swedenborg, and took his revelations 
as their criterium ; for whatever branch of human knowledge 
they might explore, a vast field of discoveries would soon open 
before them. They would not, it is true, acquire one of these 
ephemeral reputations which, in our age, we have seen dissi- 
pated even during the life time of those who have so laboriously 
sought after them ) but what is of far more value, they would 
contribute eflectually to the true progress of humanity, and 
instead of attributing the least glory to themselves, they would 
render it all to Him alone to whom it belongs. Accept, &c. 



LETTER XII. 



There is, my dear sir, m your last letter, a passage which 
has so awakened my attention, that I consider it necessary 



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159 



again to suspend the course of our exposition, in order to ex- 
amine with you the difficulty you speak of. 

You are struck, you say, with the sublimity of the new 
theories drawn from the writings of Swedenborg \ the more 
you meditate upon them, the more you find them conformable 
to sound reason, and the chain of connection between them 
tends still more to increase your admiration ; but when you 
reflect that we continue, with such rational theories, to call 
ourselves Christians, you are arrested by a serious difficulty ; 
it is impossible for you to conceive how the ideas we enter- 
tain concerning God can be reconciled with the doctrines of 
Christianity. 

This difficulty arises from several causes, but chiefly from 
the following : — 

The first is, that Christianity having for its foundation the 
acknowledgment of Jesus Christ as God, it has not yet been 
possible for you to see how this acknowledgment can agree 
with the philosophical idea of one only God, such as has hith- 
erto been developed to you. 

The second is, that still confounding Christianity with the 
different Christian sects, which all really admit three Gods, 
though with the lip they say there is but one, you are there- 
fore compelled to believe, that to be a true Christian it is neces- 
sary, when the question is about dogmas, to renounce entirely 
the use of reason. 

Permit me to tell you that if, during the w T hole of our dis- 
cussion, I have not yet once spoken to you concerning the 
Lord Jesus Christ, though I have often repeated to you that I 
was a Christian, it was not certainly through forgetfulness ; 
but because the state of your mind obliged me for the time to 
keep silence. I could not speak to you concerning the Lord 
without entering upon the doctrinal part of the Christian re- 
ligion, and of what use would it have been for me to have 
drawn your attention at first to dogmas? you, who are dispo- 



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sed to believe, it is true, but have since rejected all those doc- 
trines which were taught to you in your childhood ^ Would 
I for a single instant have been able to gain your attention % 
It was best then to begin with the philosophical part of Chris- 
tianity, and this I have done ; when you become fully con- 
vinced of the important truths which we have already discus- 
sed, and those which remain to be explained, then only will you 
be able to give your attention to the doctrinal part. 

Nevertheless, as it is important to show that our ideas con- 
cerning the Divinity, are not in the least incompatible with 
true Christianity, I will speak to you briefly concerning the re- 
demption and the Trinity. 

Concerning Redemption. Man, created free and rational, 
abused his liberty and reason ; he fell : but his fall, foreseen 
by God, was to be succeeded by a restoration; for God, who is 
love itself, could not leave him in the miserable state into 
which his fall had plunged him. Now in what manner was 
this restoration to be effected 1 To replace man in his primi- 
tive state, would not this have been to destroy his free will, 
and consequently annihilate him ? for this misery, as we may 
be assured of by the state of things at the present day, was 
pleasing to man, and constituted even all his life. Conforming 
to the laws of his own eternal order, God preserved the liberty 
of man, and proceeded to the restoration of the human race. 

You have seen, in my ninth letter, how by his fall man had 
given birth to a spiritual organism altogether opposite to the 
primitive one, and how this new organism afterwards acted 
upon our world with a force continually increasing. In the 
struggle which thence arose between the two spiritual organ 
isms, or between heaven and hell, the Divinity by his influx 
was always acting, it is true, to diminish the progress of evil 
and the false, preserving still the liberty of man ; but hell 
at length became so preponderant, that spiritual order was 
about to be broken, which would have brought with it the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



16! 



subversion of the universe ) for in consequence of this pre- 
ponderance, the divine influx, transmitted through heaven, 
was no longer sufficient to maintain order and preserve the 
creation. It was then that God had recourse to the great act 
of redemption, which had been foreseen by him, and for 
which he had provided from the beginning of time. 

This act consisted in reaching hell, confining it to its limits, 
by combatting it, so to speak, hand to hand ; for it was neces- 
sary that man should be restored to spiritual equilibrium in 
order that he might be able, by means of his free will and ra- 
tionality, to re-enter into the way of good and truth then closed 
to him. But how could the Divinity, being in essences the 
most pure, reach the enemy of men that is in essences the 
most corrupt % Indeed, you have seen that God the Creator, 
or Jehovah, resides in the bosom of the spiritual sun, and that 
the heat and light of this sun cannot even approach the angels 
of the highest heaven without being tempered by the spiritual 
atmospheres. Now Jehovah, not being able in his spiritual 
sun to approach the supreme heaven without enkindling and 
consuming this heaven, it is very evident that from the bosom 
of that sun he could not reach the hells, which are beyond the 
heavens and world of spirits. But if Jehovah could not em- 
ploy this means without destroying the laws of his divine 
order, this order, nevertheless, far from being opposed to the 
work of redemption, presented all that was necessary to effect 
it. 

You know that God or Jehovah is Vert Man, and it is 
owing to this that we his creatures, formed in his likeness and 
image, are men, that is to say, beings endowed with a will and 
understanding, susceptible of receiving his love and wisdom, 
or the good and the true ) you know also, that it is by reason 
of the form of God, that everything in creation presents either 
the human form, or a tendency more or less evident towards 
that form. Now, if you recollect the developments contained 



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in my tenth letter, concerning the formation of man, and the 
two opposite influences which he receives from the spiritual 
world, it will be easy to acknowledge that in order to approach 
the hells, combat, conquer, and subdue them, and thus accom- 
plish the great work of redemption, it was altogether confor- 
mable to the laws of divine order, for Jehovah to become flesh 
and dwell among us. 

Observe first, that Jehovah, being life itself, resides wholly, 
in this quality, in all creation, and in each of its parts, for the 
Divinity is indivisible : thus we say that God is everywhere. 
So Jehovah, who is in the. inmost of every man, without this 
residence preventing him from presiding over the government 
of the whole universe, could easily clothe himself with the ex- 
ternal of a spiritual body, without abandoning any of the at- 
tributes of Divinity. Observe next, that in making himself 
flesh, and descending thus into the last degrees of the creation, 
Jehovah, who, in his spiritual sun, could not even approach 
the heavens without consuming them, was able on the con- 
trary, without producing the least perturbation, to reach the 
deepest hells ; for the struggle of the hells against the 
heavens renewing itself every day with man, Jehovah, in 
clothing himself with humanity, placed himself upon the only 
proper arena for the combat, and where he could, without de- 
ranging his work, struggle with, conquer, and subdue the 
enemy. 

As my object here is to give you only a general idea of Re- 
demption, I will not at present treat on the important subject 
of the Incarnation } besides it would require some preliminary 
ideas which can only be explained in the doctrinal part. I 
will merely say that in Jesus Christ the internal man was Je- 
hovah himself, while the external man and the material body 
which veiled and enveloped Jehovah, was from Mary 3 that 
Jesus Christ, whose internal man was Jehovah, not having 
been, like other men, conceived of a man, had not in him the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



103 



hereditary evil with which we are ail bom ; but that his external 
man and material body, having* been produced in the womb of 
a woman, he had from the mother hereditary evil, evil which 
with him,— ^by reason of the resistance of the internal man — 
never became actual evil, as he said in these w^ords. C: Which 
of you convinceth me of sin V (John viii. 46. ). If he had not 
had external hereditary evil he never could have been temp- 
ted, for his internal man being Jehovah, that is to say, Good 
itself and Truth itself, was not in any manner susceptible of 
being tempted : thus, without this evil which was in his ex- 
ternal man, he would not have been able either to combat 
with hell, or consequently, to subdue it. By his temptations, 
his struggles, and his spiritual victories, he successively put off 
all that he had from Mary, and attained to the complete con- 
junction of his external man with his internal man which he 
calls the Father, thus making his humanity divine so that if 
Jesus Christ was for a time the son of Mary, by reason of his 
external, he is no longer so, since he rejected all that he had 
from her, and thus Jesus Christ is no other than Jehovah God, 
the Creator of all that exists, now become the Redeemer of the 
human race by his incarnation. 

All these truths, and many others which concern the incar- 
nation will be proved hereafter, and I will then enter upon all 
the details which you may desire. I will here make only one 
observation ; God or Jehovah is in us all, as I have already 
told you, for if he were not in us, we should not have life ) 
but he is only in the inmost of our being, and he is not in our 
internal man which we have from our father, as we have our 
external man from our mother; but the internal of Jesus 
Christ was Jehovah himself. Thus, though Jesus Christ had 
his external man and a material body from Mary, he was alto- 
gether different from any other man. 

Concerning the Trinity. You already see from what 
precedes, that God the Father or the Creator, and God the Son 



164 



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or the Redeemer, are one only and the same God, one only 
and the same person and not two distinct persons. But the 
Creator of men, in becoming their Redeemer, became also 
their Regenerator and Saviour , for God by redemption did not 
save a single man 3 If he had been able to save one, he would 
have saved all \ but he gave to all the possibility of being 
saved or regenerated — a possibilty which no longer at that 
time existed, by reason of the superabundance and overflowing 
profligacy of the most fatal errors and the most depraved pas- 
sion. 

Now, regeneration or salvation was the consequence of re- 
demption: indeed, before redemption, Jehovah, not having yet 
descended into the last degree of creation, could not act from 
the bosom of his spiritual sun, but by a mediate influx, that is to 
say, by the intermediation of angels and good spirits; but as soon 
as he made divine the assumed Humanity, all power was acquir- 
ed to this divine or to the divine body of Jesus Christ, whose soul 
is Jehovah himself, and it is this Divine Humanity, which from 
this moment, governs the whole universe, as well by the mediate 
influx of the heavens, as by his immediate influx. From that 
time men could receive this immediate influx. He is the 
Sanctifler or Holy Spirit, and it is by him that men can be re- 
generated or saved, if they consent to follow the impulses 
which he gives to them. 

The Holy Spirit is then no other than Jehovah-Jesus-Christ 
acting to regenerate men and preserve the universe. Thus 
God the Father or Creator, God the Son or Redeemer, and 
God the Holy Spirit or Regenerator, are one and the same God, 
one and the same person, and not three distinct persons. 
Thus the divine Trinity exists in the unity of God, and this 
only God is the Lord Jesus Christ in his glorified humanity; 
the soul of this humanity is Jehovah or the Father, his body 
is the Son, and the incessant action which his soul exercises 
by his body to regenerate men and preserve the universe, is 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



165 



the Holy Spirit. I can here do no more than announce these 
high truths ) they will be developed in the dogmatical part of 
our discussion, and you will then see that they are in perfect 
harmony both with the Scriptures and with human reason. I 
regret to speak thus briefly upon a subject which, from its na- 
ture, demands the greater elucidation; but on the other hand, 
since I shall return again to the subject, I experience a satis- 
faction in having presented to you these few ideas, for I have 
been desirous for a long time to speak to you concerning the 
Lord. Henceforth, instead of using exclusively the expression 
God, I will from preference employ that of Lord, for it is this 
which we generally make use of. Jehovah excites more partic- 
ularly the idea of God considered as Creator ; Jesus Christ the 
idea of God as Redeemer, whilst the word Lord presents to as the 
idea of the one God considered in his three grand manifestations 
of Creator, Redeemer, and Regenerator. 

Thus, my dear sir, by this brief sketch you can see that 
our ideas respecting the Divinity are perfectly reconcilable 
with Christianity, and what is more, that we are the true 
Christians. The word Christian, indeed, is derived from 
Christ, and no one can properly be called a Christian who does 
not acknowledge Jesus Christ to be God. Now, Jesus Christ 
being for us God himself, and not the second of three divine 
persons, have we not the right to claim the name of Chris- 
tians in preference to those who acknowledge him only as the 
Son of God, and worship him only as a Mediator between God 
and men, though with the lips they acknowledge him as God ? 

It is true, however, that Jesus Christ is a Mediator between 
God and man, but not as a Person distinct from the Father ; 
he is Mediator in this sense, that he is the Divine Body in 
which resides the Divine Soul or Jehovah. Now, as in ad- 
dressing a man, we cannot approach his soul, but by the medi- 
ation of his body, so we can only approach Jehovah by tho 
mediation of the Divine humanity, or glorified Body of Jesus 
, 8 



168 



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Christ. For this reason he himself said, "no man cometh 
unto the Father but by me/ J (John xiv. 6,) and for this also he 
said, "no man hath seen God at any time," (John i. 18.) In- 
deed, always enveloped with a body, whether natural as in 
this world, or spiritual as in the other life, the soul of man 
always remains invisible, and only manifests itself by the ac- 
tion of its body ; it is the same with the Divine Soul or Je- 
hovah ) enveloped now with the humanity which Jesus Christ 
assumed in this w r orld and w T hich he glorified or made divine, 
it is only manifested by the action of this Divine Humanity. 
Thus no one has ever seen, or. ever will see, Jehovah or the 
Father • but the inhabitants of the heavens see the Divine 
humanity or Jesus Christ, whose soul is Jehovah himself, 
whenever it pleases the Lord to manifest himself to them ) and 
further, they continually enjoy the presence of his spiritual 
sun which vivifies them by its heat and light. But it is not 
thus that Christians of the old church conceive of the media- 
tion, since they represent to themselves the Mediator as a 
person distinct from God the Father. 

Why do we see at this day so few Christians ? for to be 
really a Christian, it is not sufficient to have received baptism, 
nor even to follow certain religious practices ; it is absolutely 
necessary, not only to acknowledge from the heart, as I have 
said, the divinity of Jesus Christ, but to live according to the 
precepts which he has given us 3 why, I say, do we see at this 
day so few Christians % It is because the theologians of the old 
church persist in maintaining that there are three divine per- 
sons, and because it is difficult to persuade men at this day 
that three Gods make but one. Besides, how could the clergy 
of the various Christian sects convince their auditors, and con- 
vince themselves, that Jesus Christ, risen again, according to 
the Evangelists, with the body which was laid in the sepul- 
chre, is but one with God the Father, whom they consider as 
a pure Spirit, that is to say, as a Being without substance and 



MAN OK THE WORLD, 167 

form, though they make of him, nevertheless, a real person 
distinct from the person of Jesus Christ ? And do they know 
even where to place the body of the Lord Jesus Christ in that 
world which also, in their idea, being without substance and 
form, can consist of nothing but a kind of vacuum or empti- 
ness % But these difficulties, which prevent our contempora- 
ries from being Christians, completely disappear when it is 
known that the Creator of the universe is himself Very Man, 
and that all creation tends to the human form, and above all 
when the relations as simple as they are admirable are known, 
which bind the universe to man, and man to his divine 
original. 

This is a long digression, but the subject is so important, 
that you will excuse me for having interrupted the course of 
our discussion to answer a simple observation which you had 
made. 

Let us resume our exposition of the spiritual world, and 
enter upon matters of detail. 

If we see so many unbelievers, if even the man who so loudly 
proclaims the immortality of the soul, feels his faith waver 
when he seriously fixes his thought upon the passage from 
this life into the other, is it not because it is impossible for 
him to form a clear idea of this passage, after all the incohe- 
rent vagaries put forth by theologians and philosophers upon 
the soul and its mode of existence % Not knowing in an exact 
manner what the soul is, nor in wdiat part of the body it re- 
sides, is he not compelled either to consider it as a breath, that 
disengaged from its prison wanders in a vacuum, -which is re- 
pugnant to his reason, or to regard it as one of those impon- 
derable fluids which, being set free, unites Math its common 
reservoir, which is repugnant to his conscience ? This, how- 
ever, is the desolating alternative to which a reflecting man is 
reduced when he has nothing for a guide but the data of the 
old theology or those of the philosophy of the day. But it is 



168 



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altogether different when he has a precise idea of the soul, 
and of the world in which it is perpetually to reside ; then, to 
comprehend how his passage from this life to another is effect- 
ed, it is sufficient to have present in his mind the truths which 
I have previously set forth, and which it is important here to 
repeat ; 

(1.) The soul or spirit of man is a real being, having a spir- 
itual body, endowed with all the organs constituting the ma- 
terial body with which it is clothed. 

(2.) The spiritual world is a real organism, having objects 
analogous to those which we see in ours ; it has Its earths, 
seas, atmospheres, a celestial vault, which like ours is a result 
of the conformation of the eye ; it has, m fine, its three king- 
doms — animals, vegetables, minerals ; but nevertheless, there 
exists between the two worlds this difference, that in the one, 
all the objects are of a spiritual nature, while in the other, they 
are all of a material nature. 

(3.) The spiritual world, being independent of space, is not 
a place \ it is a state of the soul or spirit. Thus it cannot be 
said that it is above or below; above the skies or in the 
bowels of the earth ; here or there ) but it is in man himself — 
every one has actually in himself his heaven or his hell. 

(4.) Though independent of space and time, accidents which 
are inherent in matter alone, the spiritual world presents still 
appearances of them, appearances which result from interior 
states in w T hich those who inhabit it are successively 
placed. 

Now, we have seen in the sixth letter, that there are in 
man as many receptacles having the human form as there 
exist general divisions of the spiritual world, and that these 
receptacles are opened or remain closed, according to the 
manner in which man has lived in the natural world. You 
have seen also, in the ninth letter, that each general division 
of the spiritual world, though it be within us is nevertheless 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



109 



manifested without us ? when after our death the receptacle 
which it has in our soul or spirit is opened. 

When therefore man is stripped of his mortal covering, he 
has no need of being conveyed from one place to another, or 
of making the least progression ; he finds himself, with the 
same affections and the same thoughts, upon a spiritual earth, 
and precisely upon that which belongs to the general division 
w T hose receptacle is opened in him. 

But as the heavenly receptacles are not completely opened 
in man, unless he has neither bad affections nor false thoughts, 
and as the infernal receptacles in like manner are not com- 
pletely opened in him, until he has rejected all good affections 
and all true thoughts, it results that the greater part of men, 
in leaving our earth, find themselves without conveyance or 
transit, upon an earth of the world of spirits, or intermediate 
world, where they remain a longer or shorter time, before thev 
go definitively either into the heavens or the hells. 

Thus the passage of man from this world into the other con- 
sists simply, without conveyance or transit, in the emancipation 
of the man-spirit by the loosening of the bonds which con- 
fined him to our earth, which is effected as soon as the systolic 
and diastolic motions of the material heart have ceased for- 
ever. Then the material part of man is nothing but dead mat- 
ter , but the man, as to all that constitutes him a man, lives, 
and his senses no longer imprisoned in matter acquire proper- 
*ties much more exquisite. It is the same with his two con- 
stitutive faculties, will and understanding; they then mani- 
fest themselves in a higher degree of strength and activity. 

The passage from this world into the other is besides so 
much the easier to conceive of, as man during his life upon 
our earth is himself, without knowing it, in the spiritual world. 
He is actually there, since his affections and thoughts which 
cause him to be man, and which certainly are not matter, be- 
long only to the spiritual world : but he does not see that 



170 



LETTERS TO A 



world ; and knows nothing of that which is passing around hi3 
man-spirit, because his spiritual eyes ; as well as his other 
spiritual senses, being covered with matter, are then only used 
for that which concerns his existence upon our earth. But as 
soon as man is disengaged from his mortal envelope, his senses 
being no longer confined in an obscure prison, and entering 
upon their full exercise, it is not then surprising that he 
now sees the part of the spiritual world in which he had been 
already, though unknown to him in his natural life, and that 
he is then conscious of all that passes about him. 

Since the greater part of those who go from our globe pass 
into the world of spirits, we will first turn our attention to the 
part of that world corresponding to our earth ) but before en- 
tering into details it is necessary to give you an exact idea 
of the nature of the objects of which the intermediate world 
is composed. 

The intermediate world, being a mixed spiritual organism, 
presents a mixture of good and evil, of the beautiful and de- 
formed ; and in this respect, as in many others, bears a strong 
relation to our material world. There exists even between 
them ; at first sight, so great a resemblance that many of those 
who enter into the world of spirits, believe themselves yet to 
be in ours, and do not perceive their error until they meet 
there those who have died before them ; and see none of those 
whom they left upon our earth. As to the objects of which this 
intermediate world is composed, they have their origin in two 
opposite sources. All that is good and beautiful comes from 
the heavens, and has its origin from the love and wisdom of 
God ; all that is evil and hideous comes from the hells, and has 
its origin in hatred and folly, or the evil and the false which 
the fall of man has produced. 

You have seen in fact that the divine Love, the. source of all 
good affections, is the first substance whence proceed all 
substances which are good, and the divine Wisdom the source of 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



172 



all true thoughts, is the first or original form (Forme-Type), 
whence proceed all the beautiful forms in which these sub- 
stances are clothed. You have seen also, that since the fall of 
maiij all the affections of his selfish will were bad spiritual 
substances, and all the thoughts of his perverted understanding 
were unsightly spiritual forms with which the bad substances 
were clothed. 

Thus, every affection being a spiritual substance, and every 
thought a spiritual form, the mixture of good and bad sub- 
stances and of beautiful and hideous forms which the objects 
of the intermediate world in general present, is the effect pro- 
duced by the state of its inhabitants, whose interiors are a 
mixture of good and bad affections, of true and false thoughts. 

Besides, as the intermediate world, the same as every gen- 
eral division of the spiritual, is an exterior manifestation of 
that which is included in the man-spirit, it must present, in all 
its parts, objects whose substances are- affections, and whose 
forms are the thoughts of those who inhabit it. If the objects 
are presented there in number indefinite, and are indefinitely 
varied, it is because the affections and thoughts themselves of 
spirits present varieties whose number is unlimited. 

I have already often repeated to you that the spiritual 
world, such as it is presented to the sight of spirits and angels, 
is an exterior manifestation of that which is in their interiors. 
A consequence which, at first sight, would seem to flow from 
this principle is, that each man-spirit would see only obj ects 
which represent his affections and thoughts, and therefore, 
would live altogether isolated from other men-spirits. Now, 
if spirits did not live in society like men in our world, if they 
were prevented from communicating their affections and 
thoughts to others, however beautiful and delightful might be 
the theatre upon which they live, their existence would be the 
most sad that can be imagined, and would soon become insup- 
portable. It is then important to prove that in the interme- 



172 



LETTERS TO A 



diate world spirits live in societies like men in our world, and 
that thus the consequence which seems to result from the prin- 
ciple above stated is but specious ; but to arrive at this proof, 
I shall be obliged to give you some general ideas relative to 
correspondences. This again is a digression which it is ne- 
cessary for me to add to many others already made ; I hope, 
however, that you will continue to be as indulgent towards 
this as towards the preceding. I will first speak of the cor- 
respondences which exist between the spiritual world and 
ours. 

The spiritual world and the natural world being related to 
each other like the interior and exterior, it results from this 
that spiritual things and natural things make one by Influx, 
and that there is Correspondence between them. This is the 
principle ; but what are we to understand by this Correspon- 
dence and this Influx? Some examples to which I am about to 
have recourse will enable you easily to comprehend it. 

It is evident that the variations of man's face, or the different 
expressions of his countenance, correspond to the different 
states of the affections of his soul, for the expression of the 
countenance varies according to the state of the affections. 
These variations, which are natural effects, we call Corres- 
pondences of the affections which are the spiritual causes of 
them, and we say that the face itself is the Correspondence of 
the interiors of the soul. But, in order that these correspon- 
dences may manifest themselves, it is necessary that the soul 
should act : this action of the soul is what we call the influx 
of the spiritual principle into the natural. [See Apocalypse Ex- 
plained, number 1080.] 

It is in like manner evident that the understanding of man, 
or the sight of his thought corresponds to the sight of his 
eyes, for the light and flame which shine in his eyes man- 
ifest the thought which his understanding produces; the 
sisrht of the eye is the Correspondence as well as the eye 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



173 



itself, and the action of the understanding upon the eye 
is Influx, 

So also, the active thought which depends on the under- 
standing corresponds to the language which depends on the 
mouth and its accessories ) language is the Correspondence as 
well as the mouth and the organs which serve to produce lan- 
guage, and the action of the thought in language and in the 
organs of language is Influx. Lastly, the action of the body 
corresponds to the will y that of the heart to the life of love \ 
that of the lungs, which is called respiration, to the life of 
faith ; and the whole body, as to all its members, viscera and 
organs, corresponds to the soul, as to all its functions and all 
the forces of its life. 

By these few examples you can see that the spiritual and 
the natural make one by Correspondences, as the interior and 
the posterior, or as the efficient cause and the effect ; or again 
as the cause principal which belongs to the thought and will 
of man, and the cause instrumental which belongs to his lan- 
guage and action. 

I have taken these examples from what passes in man, that 
you may easily comprehend what we are to understand by 
Correspondence, and the Influx which manifests it ; but the 
correspondence of the natural and spiritual is general ; it not 
only has place in all that which constitutes man, but it also 
exists in all that constitutes the universe, and is a result of the 
influx of the spiritual universe into the natural. Moreover, it 
is a consequence of the principles which I have previously ex- 
plained, and which you have admitted. Every natural object 
including in it an analogous spiritual object, the spiritual is 
always in activity, and its action being the influx of which we 
are now speaking, it results that all the objects of the natural 
universe are Correspondences. 

The knowledge of these Correspondences constituted in 
ancient times a science ; it was even the science of sciences, 



174 



LETTERS TO A 



for it was the key to all knowledges ; but it was gradually cor* 
rupted by men 3 and at last entirely lost. From this corrup- 
tion arose the symbols of the eastern nations, of the hieroglyph- 
ics of the Egyptians, and all the mythologies. This science 
is at length restored to the world, and may now be studied in 
the writings of Swedenborg. When hereafter we shall exam- 
ine the doctrines of Christianity, you will be easily convinced 
that the sacred Scriptures are filled with correspondences, and 
that this science of sciences dispels all the apparent contradic- 
tions which have led our contemporaries to doubt their holiness, 
and even to deny it. 

As there is correspondence between all things of the natural 
universe and all those of the spiritual, and the spirit of man 
being a little spiritual universe, it results that there is also a 
correspondence between all the objects of the natural world, 
and all the thoughts and the affections of man, for it is his af- 
fections and thoughts which constitute his spirit. I cannot 
give you now the nomenclature of all these correspondences ; 
this would not be the place ; but it is indispensable to the un- 
derstanding of what follows to present you at first with some 
of them. 

The earth in general corresponds to man ; its different pro- 
ductions, which serve for the nourishment of men, correspond 
to different kinds of goods and truths, the solid aliments to 
various kinds of goods, and the liquid to various kinds of 
truths. 

A house corresponds to the will and the understanding, 
which constitute the human mind ; by house, we have to un- 
derstand all that serves for lodging or retreat, the palace as 
well as the hut. 

Garments correspond to truths or falses according to the 
substance, color, and form which they present. 

Animals correspond to the affections ; those which are use- 
ful and gentle, to good affections ; those which are hurtful and 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



175 



bad, to evil affections : gentle and beautiful birds to intellectual 
truths ; those which are ferocious and ugly to falses ) fishes to 
the scientifics which derive their origin from things sensual ; 
reptiles to corporeal and sensual pleasures; and noxious insects 
to falsities which proceed from the senses. 

Trees and shrubs correspond to different kinds of know- 
ledges ) and herbs and grass correspond to various kinds of 
scientific truths. 

Gold corresponds to celestial good, silver to spiritual truth, 
brass to natural good ; iron to natural truth, stones to sensual 
truths, precious stones to spiritual truths. With these few 
correspondences you will easily be able to follow the discussion. 

All that I have just said concerning the correspondences 
which exist between the spiritual and natural worlds, is appli- 
cable in general to the correspondences w T hich the great divi- 
sions of the spiritual world have between them ) for from the 
lowest degrees of creation up to the spiritual sun everything 
lives, everything is conjoined by influx which produces corres- 
pondences. Thus, the intermediate world, of which we are 
now treating, being placed between the first heaven and the 
first hell, receives an influx from both, and consequently is in 
correspondence with both. Nevertheless, between this corres- 
pondence and that of which I have just spoken to you, there 
is an important difference to be observed, namely : that here 
below the objects which surround man being natural, and con- 
sequently subject to the laws of space and time, are not de- 
pendent upon changes which are effected in his spirit, while 
in the intermediate world, the objects which surround spirits, 
being of a spiritual nature, depend upon the states of these 
spirits, and vary according as these states change. As the ob- 
jects in the intermediate world are the very representations of 
the affections and thoughts of spirits, correspondences are 
manifested there clearly to the sight, and then they are called 
representatives. 



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By means of these ideas concerning correspondences, I am 
now able to prove to you that in the intermediate world, 
spirits live in societies as in our world, and thus that the con- 
sequence which appeared to result from the principle above 
advanced is but specious. 

Let us first take spirits separately ) each one of them accor- 
ding to this principle, having for the theatre of his existence 
the exterior manifestation of his affections and thoughts, and 
no one spirit resembling another, it results, it is true, that there 
exists as many individual representative theatres, or different 
little intermediate worlds as there exist spirits ; but we shall 
presently see that all these individual theatres or little worlds 
make in fact but one. 

It is evident that the intermediate world of a Chinese or of 
a Hottentot must differ much from the intermediate world of an 
European, since the afiections and thoughts of the one have 
but little affinity with the affections and thoughts of the other : 
you will also agree that the intermediate worlds of two Chi- 
nese, or of two Hottentots, or of two Europeans must differ much 
less; observe however, that the question here is only concerning 
external effections and thoughts, such as are those of spirits ; 
for as regards internal affections and thoughts which are man- 
ifested later, those of a Chinese and European may even have 
a closer relation between them than those of two brothers. 
You will again agree that the intermediate worlds of two 
Frenchmen must differ less than those of a Frenchman and an 
Englishman, these of two Parisians less than those of a Paris- 
ian and a countryman, and those of two lawyers less than 
those of a lawyer and a merchant. 

But before extending further the inquiry into the resem- 
blances which these little intermediate worlds must present, 
let us first see what, according to the science of correspon- 
dences, is in general the intermediate world of a spirit. As a 
spirit is really a man, and the earth is the correspondence of 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



177 



man ; this spirit finds himself upon an earth ; as he has a will 
and an understanding, he dwells in a house ; as he is imbued 
with truths and falses ? he has garments ; but the nature of this 
earth, as to its fertility and aspect, depends upon the general 
state of this spirit ; the grandeur and beauty of the house are 
in relation to the state of his will and understanding 3 the sub- 
stance, the color, and the form of his garments depend upon 
the mixture of his truths and falses. Lastly, as this spirit pos- 
sesses affections and thoughts, and a multitude of things which 
are the consequences of them, he sees in his horizon and around 
him objects of the three kingdoms, and products of industry ; 
but the nature of these objects and these products depends 
upon the state of his affections and thoughts. 

The representative theatre of the state of this spirit camiot re- 
semble in an absolute manner that of any other spirit, for in the 
whole universe of beings, there are no two that completely re- 
semble each other; nevertheless, diversity in unity being a 
general law of creation, everything tends to unity ] to attain 
this, everything is arranged into groups, and it is by means of 
harmonious relations that the different groups are formed. 
Now, if there are not two men, nor consequently two spirits, 
who resemble each other in an absolute manner, at least there 
exist, in a greater or less number, those whose affections and 
thoughts present among them many resemblances, and have, 
so to speak, a kind of neighborhood. The representative 
theatres of the states of these spirits having consequently an- 
alogous relations between them, find themselves, so to speak, 
neighbors one of another, or to express it more exactty, they 
constitute one country of the intermediate world, which is 
common to them, and are only distinguished from one another 
by slight differences, and by the particular habitation of each 
spirit: and these habitations exist more or less near to one 
another, according as the affections and thoughts of spirits 
have more or less similitude between them. Thence result 



178 



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united masses of which the villages, towns, and cities of greater 
or less extent are composed, which are spread over the earth 
of our intermediate world. 

Yon can easily conceive from this, how the millions of rep- 
resentative theatres or little individual worlds concur in form- 
ing a whole. There is actually but one only intermediate 
world for all the spirits who depart from our globe ; but there 
exist millions of different horizons ; in the same country the 
horizon of one is never completely like that of another, and 
the horizon of each spirit varies even at every instant accord- 
ing to the mobility of the state of his affections and thoughts. 
Ah ! do we not see something analogous in our world, in both 
a physical and moral respect 1 In the physical, are not the 
horizons in number indefinite, and does not a man change his 
horizon at every change of place ? And in the moral, in the 
domain of affection and thought, is the horizon of one ever 
like that of another ? Does not the horizon of the same man 
change at every instant ? 

But there are also spirits whose affections and thoughts pre- 
sent more intimate relations, and have a kind of kindred and 
family, so that there is with them so to speak, the same will 
and the same understanding; the representative theatres of 
the state of these spirits present not only a country which is 
common to them, but also one and the same edifice for a hab- 
itation ; and under this relation these theatres are distinguish- 
ed only by particular parts of the same house ; or only by 
other details of the interior of this house. It is thus that fam- 
ilies are formed in the world of spirits ; they are the result of 
a more intimate conformity in affections and thoughts. 

If to all that precedes yon add, that in the spiritual world 
there must necessarily be, as in this, and even in a much high- 
er degree, communication of affections and thoughts between 
those who have some relations between them, it will be easy 
for you to comprehend that spirits of the same country see one 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



another, and see also the exterior of their neighbor's house, 
and penetrate even into the interior of those houses, or visit 
those who inhabit them, when for the time they have with 
them the same will and the same understanding. 

Observe, moreover, that if, in this natural world, our affec- 
tions and thoughts are not exclusively fixed upon things, but 
are also determined to persons, it must be the same in the in- 
termediate world. There, when the affections and thoughts 
are fixed upon religious, moral, political, or civil matters, they 
are manifested visibly by spiritual objects which are the cor- 
respondences of them ) but when they are fixed upon other 
spirits, they are immediately present, though their proper habita- 
tion maybe in the most remote part of the intermediate world. 
And this is easily conceived, since affection and thought 
know no distance. Have you an intimate friend beyond the 
seas, at Philadelphia, for example ? If you think of him, you 
see him, you speak to him • and if he does not hear you, if he 
does not answer your questions, it is only because you are 
both in a material world, and space and time oppose your 
communication of ideas ) but abstract matter, put away space 
and time, and you are in the presence of your friend ; he then 
hears you and you enter into conversation. It is thus that it 
should be, and really is, in the intermediate world, since space 
and time are there replaced by states of affection and thought, 
states which are manifested only in an appearence of space 
and time. 

You see from this, that spirits do not live separately but in 
society, although the intermediate world is for every spirit 
the exterior manifestation of what is contained in him. The 
affections and thoughts are what every spirit has within him, 
and these are a consequence of those which he had in our 
world ; the lattei are never entirely effaced, but are only re- 
moved from his memory, so that occasionally they are repro- 
duced. The life of man is not interrupted by his passage from 



ISO 



LETTERS TO A 



this world into another : it is continued, and his memory then 
is in all its vigor; for there is not a single action of his life, 
nor a single idea, which may not be recalled. If man. after 
becoming a spirit, had no recollection of his life in the world, 
he would be deprived of his individuality, and consequently 
of immortality, because it would not be he who would exist ; 
it would be really another being in his place. 

The ordinary residence of the man-spirit being the corres- 
pondence of the habitual state of his will and understanding, so 
long as this state is not entirely changed, the man-spirit pre- 
serves the same residence, without being forced to remain 
continually in his house or city : for certain affections and 
thoughts may lead him to travel over the different countries of 
our intermediate world, and even to visit the earths of the in- 
termediate world which correspond to the other planets of the 
natural world, without the habitual state of his will and under- 
standing being remarkably altered ; but if this state is entirely 
changed, he himself changes his abode. 

Changes of residence are very frequent in the intermediate 
world ) for man only goes into this world to be prepared there 
by successive transitions, either for the heavenly or infernal 
life. He is then obliged to pass through many states, and con- 
sequently often changes his abode, before repairing to his place, 
whether in heaven or hell. 

The future life of man depends entirely upon that which he 
has formed for himself upon our earth ; if during this life his 
will had been bad, it is no longer possible for him to make it 
good, and his understanding, at the same time enlightened by 
truth, will lose its light or its truth^in the intermediate world; 
on the other hand, if his will had been good, it is in no danger 
of becoming bad, and his understanding will exchange any 
false opinions it may have for truths. I will return to this 
subject at another time. 

Thus, all depends upon the will which man has made for 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



18* 



himself in the natural world 3 or, in other words, all depends 
upon his ruling love. The will or ruling love of man is the 
man himself ; his understanding is but a servant at the dispo- 
sition of his will. All that appertains to the will is a spiritual 
substance, and all that belongsto the understanding is a spiritu- 
al form ) so far then as the substance excels the form, so far 
the will governs the understanding. 

Nevertheless, as the life of man is not interrupted by his 
passage from this world into another, the situations of those 
who arrive in the intermediate world is generally, at first, very 
similar to that which they had upon our earth ; but this is not 
of long duration, for the scene soon changes. Every spirit 
being directed by his ruling love, if this love is good, since it 
rules over all the other affections, it successively removes those 
which are bad, and favors those which are good ; then the in- 
terior state of the spirits continually improves, and his exteri- 
or situation becomes more beautiful, by means of delightful rep- 
resentatives, which are the correspondences of his interior 
state. But if the ruling love is bad, it successively removes 
the good affections and favors the bad ; then the interior state of 
the spirit continually becomes worse, and his exterior situa- 
tion becomes more and more miserable, by means of hideous 
representatives, which are the correspondences of his interior 
state. 

I will continue the description of the world of spirits in the 
following letter; but I cannot conclude this without present- 
ing to you some reflections. 

The imminent peril which social order is in at this day is 
at length understood, and great efforts are made to avert it ; 
those who lately smiled with contempt at the bare name of re- 
ligion, now think it might come to their help, and are the first 
to invoke its support ; but religion will remain impotent in 
this respect, so long as they persist in relying upon the falsified 
doctrines of the old Church. If Christianity no longer exists. 



182 



LETTERS TO A 



so to speak, but in name, or if .it is no longer effectual to render 
those moral who call themselves Christians, it is owing to the 
causes which I have already explained ; but it is chiefly be- 
cause its two principal branches have each adopted a perni- 
cious error, which they persist in spreading among the pe o- 
ple; Roman Catholicism, in affirming that the absolution of 
the priest, or even a single prayer of repentance, at the mo- 
ment of death, opens heaven ; Protestantism, in maintaining 
that it is sufficient for man to believe that the blood of Christ 
has saved him. These two doctrines are no doubt consoling ; 
they even present a charm to whoever believes in another life ; 
but they are absolutely false, and so much the more danger- 
ous, as they give to man a kind of security, which prevents 
him from thinking seriously of reformation. 

Man, indeed, is naturally led to procrastinate, when the oc- 
cupation of his life should be to struggle against his bad pas- 
sions * now, to tell him that a single prayer of repentance 
may save him, is. not this flattering his natural propensity ? 
It will be in vain to add that he may die without having time 
to address one single word to the Divinity ; it will be in vain 
to cite to him examples in support of what you say ; he will 
soothe himself with the hope of not dying suddenly, or even 
if you succeed in making some impression upon him, that im- 
presion will be but momentary. 

On the other hand, if it is sufficient for man to believe that 
the blood of Christ has saved him, why should he struggle 
against his bad passions, since he has need of nothing but this 
faith ? 

In each of these two branches of Christianity reformation of 
life cannot then be really undertaken except by very few per- 
sons ) and the generality of Christians will not be in the least 
interested in changing their course of life, as every day's ex- 
perience sufficiently proves. 

Suppose men on the contrary, to be inwardly penetrated 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



183 



with the great truths which the New Church of the Lord pro- 
claims they would certainly manifest the greatest inconsistency 
if they hesitated a single moment to enter upon the way of re- 
formation and regeneration. Convinced that repentance is 
nothing, and that faith is nothing, if there is not a change of 
life — convinced that man carries with him 7 into the other life, 
his ruling love — that there this ruling love will strip him suc- 
cessively of all his vices if he is good, and of all his good qual- 
ities if he is bad, and will thus render him fit to become either 
free in heaven or a slave in hell — would he not use all his efforts 
to make this love good, especially when the rational knowledge 
which he would have of the spiritual world would no longer 
permit him to have the least doubt of its existence ? 

Hereafter, when you become acquainted with our doctrines, 
and the admirable morality which they teach, I will return to 
this subject ; and then you will acquire the inward conviction, 
that it is only the New Church of the Lord, that is to say, the 
New Jerusalem, that can cause peace and tranquility to reign 
upon the earth. Accept, &c 



LETTER XIII. 

In my last letter, my dear sir, I showed you that the world 
into which man enters immediately after death is altogether 
like ours, except the difference existing between what is spir- 
itual and what is natural ; you have seen besides, that though 
the world of spirits was for man the exterior manifestation of 
his affections and thoughts, he could, nevertheless, in that 
world, have relations not only with those whom he had known 
during their natural life, but also with spirits who, in our world, 
had lived in foreign countries, or- even upon oilier earths. 



184 



LETTER? TO A 



Now, as it is impossible that relations should be established be- 
tween spirits the same as among men, without the use of some 
language, the first question which we have now to examine is 
this : In what language do spirits converse with each other ? 

This question would no doubt appear absolutely idle to our 
philosophers and theologians. Why, indeed, should they ask 
about the language of spirits, since, in their view, a spirit is 
without organs ? since, in their view, the other world, contain- 
ing neither substances nor forms, is but an immense vacuum, 
or something which has but an imaginary existence ? 

It is thus they think when they are shut up in their studies ) 
but let a painful event drive them from their pretended science, 
and immediately the truth, piercing through the darkness 
which obscures their understanding, becomes manifest to 
them. 

Behold the philosophical spiritualist who has just lost a 
beloved child ; it is in vain he calls to his aid the arguments of 
his school concerning the immortality of the soul ; they re- 
main altogether impotent to console his grief • with them, 
there is nothing which can retrace the form of his infant, its 
smile, its graces, and its infantine language, every word of 
which came so agreeably to his ear \ all this is destroyed, des- 
iroyed for ever. This he says, this he repeats in his despair ; 
aut suddenly a ray of truth pierces the clouds of his under- 
standing — he raises his eyes to heaven, and represents to him- 
self his child, like one of those angels which painters have in 
their pictures ; immediately he feels his heart dilate, his res- 
piration becomes more free \ oh, how precious is this thought 
to him ! how it sooths his grief! he would give everything to 
retain it ; but his reason, which science has perverted, soon 
deprives him of this only consolation, and he falls again into 
his mournful despair. Oh, philosophers ! you often pay dear 
for the frivolous pleasures which your science procures for 
you; unite it then to true theology, and you will render it be- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



185 



neficent both for those whom you wish to instruct, and for 
yourselves. 

When a theologian is with his mother, whom death has just 
deprived of her husband, what are the arguments which he 
employs to soothe her affliction 1 Does he tell her that she 
will again see, after a lapse of ages, him for whom she weeps ? 
Does he himself believe, in the effusion of his grief, that he 
will not find again his father, until after the complete destruc- 
tion of our world ? Oh surely, such a thought is far from him. 
He then believes that the object of their regret yet exists really 
in a human form. Hear him addressing his mother : You will 
see him again, says he ; moderate your grief \ we shall meet 
him again as soon as it pleases God to call us. Such then is 
his language ) for in the overflowing of his filial grief, his false 
science is forgotten,- and a ray of truth penetrates even to him. 

It is thus our philosophers and theologians give the lie to their 
own science, whenever truth is able to penetrate the clouds of 
their understandings. 

But when they have re-entered their studies, say nothing 
more to them about the soul or spirit under a human form ; 
present to them no more the other world as a real world con- 
taining spiritual substances and forms ] tell them not that the 
inhabitants of that world converse together as we do in ours ) 
they will laugh you in the face, grave as they are ; but, my 
dear friend, let us, far from laughing at their blindness, rather 
pity them, for the more they think themselves clear-sighted 
the more are they objects of pity. 

The question which is now to engage our attention will not 
then consist in the enquiry whether spirits speak or not } for 
the moment that we acknowledge that they have a mouth, a 
tongue, and ears, and that they live surrounded by a spiritual 
atmosphere, it at once becomes evident that they can produce 
sounds and hear those which others produce. So we have 
only to examine what must be the language which spirits make 



186 



LETTERS TO A 



use of in their intercourse with one another. This examina- 
tion will again require some digressions 3 for if in this world the 
language of man depends upon his memory and his thoughts, 
it must be the same when he lives in the world of spirits ; it is 
absolutely necessary then that I should give you some expla- 
nation, first concerning the memory of man, and afterwards 
concerning his thought. 

Since men have lost true spiritual knowledge, they have in 
Tain endeavored to resolve the problems which most con- 
cern the happiness of humanity ; so they are as much in the 
dark when they speak of the memory of man, as when they 
treat of the immortality of his soul. And how could it be 
otherwise ? Must not all the questions of philosophy be re- 
ferred to one general principle ? Now, this principle they 
misunderstand ) they are not willing to comprehend that every 
natural thing envelopes an analogous spiritual one, with which 
it is in correspondence. If they admitted this principle, they 
would then know that there are in men two memories, the 
one natural and external, the other spiritual and internal ; they 
would consequently know that these two memories, though 
they seem to be confounded, must nevertheless be distinct 
from each other. 

If our two memories seem to be confounded and make but 
one, this should not by any means surprise us ) is it not the 
same with our spiritual man and our natural man % If then 
man does not perceive that in his natural man there is a spir- 
itual man, no more should he perceive that in his natural mem- 
ory there is a spiritual memory : besides, he reflects but little 
upon this subject, because he immerses his life in corporeal 
things, and can with difficulty withdraw his mind from them . 

All that man thinks, wills, says, and does, all that he hears 
and sees, everything, in a word, is received instantly in his 
interior memory, and there remains impressed forever: noth- 
ing thus received is entirely effaced from this memory ; they 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



18? 



are not there confounded whatever be their number, which 
may seem astonishing ) but this proceeds from the very con- 
stitution of man who was created in the image of God ; for if 
the infinite is in God alone, indefinites are in his spiritual sun, 
as I have already told you, and exist as in an image in the cre- 
ated universe. It thence results that the interior memory of 
man can receive things in number indefinite, and preserve all 
their impressions ; it retains even the impressions of things 
which, having become a habit in the life of man, are entirely 
effaced from his exterior memory ; in a word, it is in reality 
the book of his life. 

When man leaves this world, he comes into the full pos- 
session of his interior memory, which is the memory of his 
spirit, and though he has no longer his natural body, he is not 
deprived of his exterior memory. In what way he can also 
enjoy this memory shall now be shown. As the things purely 
natural which are in it cannot be produced in the other life, 
the spiritual things which are adjoined to them by correspon- 
dences are represented in their place in a form altogether sim- 
ilar, so that the life of man is really continued in the spiritual 
world, by means of this representation of things purely natural. 
It is thus that the man-spirit does not cease to be the same 
man that has lived in the natural world ; his identity is per- 
fect, since he can thus remember all that he has done during 
his life in this world. If it were not so would there not be 
something wanting to his immortal existence ? 

I have just said that the happiness of humanity depended 
also upon the solution of the problem of the memory ; as this 
assertion may have appeared to you rash, it is necessary to cor- 
roborate it here by some reflections. 

Though you may have given but little attention to the study 
of man, it is easy to see that he himself is most generally the 
cause of his own happiness, and that it would again be possi- 
ble for him to live happy upon this earth, if he knew and 



188 



LETTERS TO A 



would moderate his passions. This truth is proclaimed in all 
the pulpits ; it is written in all treatises on morality * we find 
it in all books of popular instruction. Why, then, does man 
remain deaf to the lessons of his instructors, to the advice of 
moralists, to the threatening exhortations of the priests I Why 
does he continue to let himself be drawn away by his bad pas- 
sions ? It is because it is not sufficient to tell him that God 
sees his secret thoughts ; it is necessary also to show him that 
these thoughts will be publicly divulged, and above all, to 
prove to him how this will be done. Now, so long as God is 
represented to him as a pure spirit, without substance or form, 
so long as the soul is in his view but a breath — so long as the 
spiritual world is looked upon by him as something void, with* 
out any objects whatever — the sermons the best prepared to 
produce effect, will make no impression upon him ; if he is 
affected by them, it is only for the moment, and he will very 
soon fall again into his former errors. But when he knows 
that God is Very Man — when he is informed that on putting 
off his natural body, his soul is still invested with a spiritual 
body, and that he then enjoys all his senses in a degree much 
more elevated than during his existence upon our earth — when 
he knows that the world of spirits, into which he will enter 
after putting off his material body, is like ours, except the dif- 
ference between what is spiritual and what is natural, and that 
this world includes innumerable spiritual objects which cor- 
respond to natural objects — it will be sufficient then to give 
him some explanations concerning his interior memory in 
order to produce the conviction that his most secret thoughts 
will one day be publicly divulged. Suppose now that he 
should be penetrated with this truth, would he not strive with 
all his might to repress within himself every thought which 
is of a guilty nature ? From this there would be but one step 
to reformation, which would conduct him to happiness so far 
as it can be hoped for upon earth. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



189 



As to the manner in which the secret thoughts and actions 
of man are divulged, it is easy to conceive. All that man has 
thought, willed, said, and done in this world, being inscribed 
in his interior memory, and the intermediate world being for 
every spirit a representative theatre of his thoughts and affec- 
tions, it is only necessary that a shorter or longer period of the 
terrestrial life of a man-spirit should be suddenly recalled to 
his memory in order that all things which relate to that 
thought, and even their smallest particulars, may be immedi- 
ately manifested by representatives to the sight of all the spirits 
near him. 

It is thus that the book of man's life is opened, and it is thus 
he is judged. Such is the law of the divine order, a law as 
inflexible as justice, but admirable as all that is divine, since 
it provides that every one shall be judged according to his 
works. 

Yet this divulging of the thoughts and actions of man is not 
effected as soon as he enters into the intermediate world, for 
he is then in the exteriors of his spirit, and he preserves them 
for a longer or shorter time, according to his greater or less at- 
tachment to external things; but it is effected when, being 
entirely divested of his exteriors, he comes forever into the 
interiors of his spirit. This is not the place to speak of the 
different states through which man passes during his sojourn 
in the world of spirits ) we will give some attention to this 
hereafter. But as the subject is now concerning the manifes- 
tation of the thoughts and actions of man by means of his 
memory, I will present you with an extract from Swedenborg, 
in which you will find in the first place several explanatory 
examples, and afterward the principles which govern this sub- 
ject. In the Treatise concerning Heaven and Hell, Nos. 462, 
463, he says : 

"But still the difference between the life of man in the 
spiritual worid, and his life in the natural world, is great, as 

9 



190 



LETTERS TO A 



well with respect to the external senses and their affections, as 
with respect to the internal senses and their affections. Those 
who are in heaven perceive, that is, they see and hear more 
exquisitely, and also think more wisely, than when they were 
in the world ; for they see from the light of heaven, which 
exceeds by many degrees the light of the world ) they hear 
also by a spiritual atmosphere, which likewise exceeds 
by many degrees that of the earth, the difference of these 
external senses is as the difference of sun-shine in respect 
to the obscurity of a mist in the world, and as the differ- 
ence of light at mid-day in respect to shade in the evening : 
for the light of heaven, because it is divine truth, gives 
to the sight of the angels to perceive and distinguish things 
the most minute. Their external sight also corresponds 
to their internal sight, or the understanding : for with the an- 
gels one sight flows into the other, so that they act as one ; 
hence they have so great acuteness; and in like manner also 
the hearing corresponds to their perception, which is as well 
of the understanding as of the will • hence, in the sound and 
words of one speaking they perceive the most minute things 
of his affection and thought ) in sound the things which are of 
affection, and in the words the things which are of thought : 
see above. But the rest of the senses with the angels are not 
so exquisite as the senses of seeing and hearing, because see- 
ing and hearing are serviceable to their intelligence and wis- 
dom, but not the rest — which, if they were in a like degree 
exquisite, would take away the light and delight of their wis- 
dom, and would bring in the delight of pleasures, which are ef 
the various appetites of the body, which obscure and debilitate 
the understanding in proportion as they prevail : as also in the 
case with men in the world, who are dull and stupid as to 
spiritual truths, in proportion as they indulge the taste and tan- 
gible blandishments of the body. That the interior senses of 
the angels of heaven, which are of their thought and affection, 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



191 



are also more exquisite and perfect than what they had in the 
world, may be manifest from what has been said and shown 
in the article concerning the wisdom of angels of heaven, (No. 
265-275). But as to what concerns the difference of the state 
of those who are in hell in respect to their state in the world, 
it also is great ; as great as is the perfection and excellence of 
the external and internal senses of angels who are in heaven, 
so great is the imperfection of those who are in hell. But the 
state of these will be treated of in what follows. 

" That man, when he passes out of the world, has also with 
him all his memory, has been shown by many circumstances ) 
concerning which many things worthy to be mentioned have 
been seen and heard, some of which I will relate in order. 
There were those who denied the crimes and villanies which 
they had perpetrated in the world, wherefore lest they should 
be believed innocent, all were disclosed and were recounted 
from their memory, in order from their earliest age to the 
latest ) they were principally adulteries and whoredoms. There 
were some who had deceived others by wicked arts and who 
had stolen ; their deceits and thefts were also enumerated in 
a series, many of which were known to scarcely any one in 
the world, except to themselves alone ; they also acknowl- 
edged them, because they were made manifest as in the light, 
with every thought, intention, delights and fear, which then 
together agitated their minds. There were some who had 
accepted bribes, and had made gain of judgement ) they from 
their memory were in like manner explored, and from it were 
recounted all things from the first period of their office to the 
last; every particular, as to quality and quantity, together 
with the time, the state of their mind, and intention, all which 
things were at the same time brought to their recollection, and 
shown to their sight, which were more than several hundreds. 
This was done in some cases ; and what is wonderful, their 
memorandum books themselves, in which they had written 



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such things, were opened and read before them, from page to 
page. There were some who had enticed virgins to acts of 
fornication, and who had violated chastity, and they were 
called to a similar judgment ; and every particular of their 
crimes was taken and recited from their memory \ the very 
faces of the virgins and women were also produced as present, 
with places, speeches, and purposes, and this as suddenly as 
when any thing is presented to view ) the manifestations con- 
tinued sometimes for hours together. There was one who 
had esteemed backbiting others as nothing, and I heard his 
backbitings recounted in order, and defamations also with the 
very words, the persons concerning whom and before whom 
he had uttered them — all were produced and presented to the 
life at the same time ; and yet every particular was studiously 
concealed by him when he lived in the world. There was a 
certain one who had deprived a relation of his inheritance, 
under a fraudulent pretext : he was, in like manner, convicted 
and judged, and, what is wonderful, the letters and notes 
which passed between them were read in my hearing, and it 
was said that there was not a word wanting. The same person 
also, shortly before his death, clandestinely destroyed his neigh- 
bor by poison, which was disclosed in this manner ; he appeared 
to dig a hole under ground, from which a man came forth as out 
of a sepulchre, and cried out to him, L What have you done to 
me V then everything was revealed, how the murderer talked 
with him in a friendly manner, and held out the cup, also what 
he thought before, and what afterwards came to pass ; which 
things being disclosed, he was sentenced to hell. In a word, 
all evils, villanies, robberies, artifices, deceits, are manifested 
to every evil spirit, and brought forth from his very memory, 
and he is convicted ) nor is there any room given for denial 
because all the circumstances appear together. I have heard 
also from the memory of a certain one, when it was seen and 
surveyed by the angels, what his thoughts had been within a 



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103 



month, one day after another, and this without fallacy, which 
were recalled as he himself was in them on those days. From 
these examples it may be manifest, that man carries along 
with him all his memory, and that there is nothing, however 
concealed in the world, which is not manifested after death ; 
and this in the company of several, according to the Lord's 
words ; " There is nothing hidden which shall not be uncovered 
and nothing concealed which shall not be known ; thereforG 
the things which ye have said in darkness shall be heard in 
light, and what ye have spoken into the ear shall be preached 
on the house-tops. 77 — Luke, xii. 2. 3. 

u When man's acts are disclosed to him after death, the an- 
gels then to whom is given the office of inquisition, look into 
his face, and the search is extended through the whole body, 
beginning from the fingers of one hand, and of the other, and 
thus proceeding through the whole. Because I wondered 
whence this was, it was disclosed to me, viz., that as all things 
of the thought and will are inscribed on the brain, for their 
principles are there, so also they are inscribed on their whole 
body ; since all things of thought and will proceed thither 
from their principles, and there terminate, as in their ultimates. 
Hence it is, that the things which are inscribed on the mem- 
ory, from the will, and thence its thought, are not only inscrib- 
ed on the brain, but also on the whole man, and there exist in 
order, according to the order of the parts of the body. Hence 
it was made evident that man in the whole is such as he is in his 
will and thought thence, so that an evil man is his own evil, and 
a good man is his own good. From these things also it maybe 
manifest what is meant by the book of man 7 slife spoken of in 
the word, that is, that all things, both which have been acted and 
thought, are inscribed on the whole man, and that they appear 
as if read in a book when they are called forth from the mem- 
ory, and as seen in effigy when the spirit is seen in the light 
of heaven. To these things I will add something memorable 



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concerning the memory ol man remaining after death, by which 

I was confirmed, that not only general things but also the most 
singular, which have entered the memory, remain, nor are 
they ever obliterated. There appeared to me books with writ- 
tings therein, as in the world, and I was instructed that they 
were from the memory of those who wrote, and that there 
was not a single word wanting there, which was in the book 
written by the same person in the world ) and that thus from 
the memory of another may be taken the most singular things 
of all, even those which he himself in the world had forgotten. 
The reason was also disclosed, viz., that man has an external 
and internal memory, an external which is of his natural 
man, and an internal which is of his spiritual man ) and that 
everything that man has thought, willed, spoken, done, also 
that he has heard or seen, is inscribed on his spiritual memory; 
and that the things which are there are never erased, since they 
are inscribed at the same time on the spirit itself, and on the 
members of its body, as was said above ) and that thus the 
spirit is formed according to the thoughts and acts of its will. 
I know that these things appear as paradoxes, and thence are 
scarcely believed, but still they are true. Let not man there- 
fore believe that anything which a man has thought in him- 
self, and has done in secret, is concealed after death ; but let 
him believe that each and all things then appear as in clear 
day" 

I have transcribed this passage for two reasons ) first, be- 
cause the details and principles which it contains throw light 
upon the subject which engages our attention ) and next, I 
was desirous of showing you with what candor Swedenborg 
relates what he has seen, though he well knew how difficult it 
would be for men to believe his relations. 

Let us now return to the exterior or natural memory. I 
have already said that all things purely natural, which are in 
that memory, cannot be reproduced in the other life, but in 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



195 



their place are corresponding spiritual things in a form absolute- 
ly similar ; now, things purely natural; being those which 
are neither intellectual nor rational, we must rank among them 
all the words of earthly languages, for there is nothing intel- 
lectual or rational in these words. It thence results that our 
natural languages cannot be of any use in the world of 
spirits ) if there exist books there which seem to include, as 
you have just seen, the same words as our books, they are re- 
presentative appearances, which have but a simple relation of 
correspondence with the language of spirits, and you will ac- 
knowledge presently that in this language words become abso- 
lutely useless. In our w T orld, it is true, men cannot converse 
with one another without the use of languages divided into ar- 
ticulate sounds, that is, into words, and do not understand each 
other unless they are acquainted with the same language ) but 
it is because they are immersed in things purely natural and 
corporeal, and cannot withdraw their minds from them. 

The language of man depending not only upon his memory, 
but his thought, we have now to carry onr investigations to the 
nature of thought ; will you for a moment lend me all your at- 
tention ? 

If man would reflect upon what passes within him, he 
would acknowledge that his language is nothing else than his 
thought speaking by means of the organs of his body. Indeed 
the thought of man is active or passive ) it is active when he 
speaks and passive when he is silent. Now, his active thought, 
which we may also call his speaking thought, expresses itself 
according to a mode proper to itself ; and by the activity of its 
language, it excites the organs of the body which correspond 
to this language. I confess however, that at the first examination 
it seems to man, that the words of his language are in his 
thought ; but should not every reflecting man hesitate before 
concluding from a first appearence ? Does he not know that 
he lives in the midst of illusions of every kind 1 If the pro- 



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gress of the physical sciences has discovered so many illusions 

of the senses which had, for thousands of years, been taken 
for realities should not a progress of theology and philosophy 
also unveil them % Well, this appearance that the words of the 
language of man ar e in his thoughts is pure illusion * it is only 
the sense of a language which is in thought. In a word, when 
man speaks his thought is the language of his spirit, and if it 
does not then appear to him to be a language, it is because it 
conjoins itself to the language of the body, and is in this lan- 
guage. Besides, it is easy to acknowledge that the language 
of the thought differs much from the language of words; 
since man can think in one minute what it takes him a long 
time to speak, it is very evident that he could not speak with 
so much readiness, if the language of thought was composed 
of words, like that of the body. (See the Arcana Celestia, no. 
3879. 4052. 6987.) 

But, you will say, In what then does the language of the 
thought consist 1 This I can now explain to you in a few 
words. 

The thought of man is composed of ideas, as a phrase is 
composed of words ) thus in the language of the mind one idea 
of his thought follows another, as in the language of the body 
one word follows another word ; but the ideas of the thought 
succeed one another with so much rapidity, that during our 
life in this world, it seems to us that the thought is continuous 
and does not present any distinction in it. (See the Arcana 
Celestia, no. 6599.) 

The language of the mind of man then is composed of ideas 
of his thought, and it is by the influx of this language into the 
correspondent organs of the body that the language of words is 
produced. Thus when man leaves this world, as he divests 
himself of all that was of use to the body, he leaves with it all 
the words of human languages with which he was acquainted 
and as he carries with him all that belongs to his mind, he 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



197 



finds himself in possession of all his thoughts and memory, as 
well interior as exterior, excepting, as to the latter, the modi- 
fications of which I have spoken to you • and it is by means 
of his interior memory and of the ideas of his thoughts, that 
he expresses himself in his new abode. Human. thought, says 
Swedenborg, then becomes more distinct and clear, and the 
ideas of the thought become discrete, so that they serve for 
distinct forms of speech. What was obscure is dissipated, and 
thus the thought, delivered from the fetters, as it were, with 
which it was bound, consequently from the shadows in which 
it was involved, becomes more instantly perceived ; thence it 
results that the intuition, perception, and utterance of every 
particular contained in it are rendered more immediate. (A .C. 
1757.) 

It is then ideas of the thought which take the place of words ; 
and these ideas, which we cannot distinguish here on earth, 
being clearly manifested when we are freed from our natural 
body, become then distinct forms of our language. It must 
not be supposed, however, that this language is mute ) it is 
manifested exteriorly like that of men, by means of sounds 
which are produced and are heard like those of our language ; 
for spirits, as you know, having a mouth, tongue, and ears, and 
being surrounded by a spiritual atmosphere, respire in this at- 
mosphere ) and by means of that respiration and of organs of 
language, they produce words like men in our world. Then 
the ideas of their thought, and the words of their speech make 
one, as the efficient cause and the effect ] for that which exists 
as a cause, in the ideas of thought, is manifested as an effect 
in words. 

You may now see what is the principal difference which ex- 
ists between the language of the ideas of thought and the 
language of words ; the latter is altogether conventional, as its 
very construction proves ; and the former is above all conven- 
tion, as it flows from the affection itself, and the thought itself 



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of the man-spirit ) in this language, sound corresponds to af- 
fection, and the articulation of the sound corresponds to the 
ideas of the thought which proceeds from the affection. 

The language of words being with us altogether conventional, 
it results that the inhabitants of our world cannot, in their 
present state, understand one another except they are ac- 
quainted with the same conventional language. The language 
of the ideas of thought being, on the contrary, above all con- 
vention, it results that it is spoken and understood by all 
spirits without being obliged to learn it • for one affection al- 
ways manifests itself by the sound which is proper to it, and 
one idea of thought by the articulation which alone agrees 
with it. 

From all that precedes we must necessarily conclude, that 
the language which is spoken in the world of spirits is the real 
universal language ; and that this language can never be un- 
derstood upon our earth, so long as men are immersed in 
things purely natural and corporeal, and will not elevate them- 
selves to things really rational and intellectual. 

Thus, every man who leaves this earth, is able to speak the 
universal language as soon as he enters into the intermediate 
world j and he can by this means converse, not only with the 
spirits who have inhabited our earth, whatever may have been 
their language here, but with spirits who may have belonged 
to one of those innumerable earths which compose the natural 
universe. The correspondence which exists between the 
language of thought and the language of words, causes man, 
in the first moments of his new sojourn, to speak this language 
without being aware of it, believing that he is expressing him- 
self in the language he made use of in the world. 

You have, no doubt, my dear sir, met with, among your ac- 
quaintances, some enthusiastic admirer of mucic, an honest 
man, who believes in the immortality of the soul, after the 
manner of our psychologists. Speak to him, I pray you, of 



MAN OF THK WORLD. 



199 



our ideas concerning spiritual substances and forms ) tell him 
that in the other world we shall live in a spiritual body in the 
midst of an immaterial atmosphere. He will regard you at 
first with attention, to assure himself whether you are speak- 
ing seriously, and if he does not see you smile, he will think 
you have lost your senses, though he may not tell you so to 
your face ; that will depend upon the degree of familiarity 
which exists between you. Let not this contempt for your 
new faith disconcert you, but ask him if he believes in the 
immortality of the soul : he will answer you in the affirma- 
tive * ask him if he thinks that the soul of the good man will 
live in a happy state : he will tell you, yes * ask him if he 
knows in what consists the happiness of that soul j upon this 
point his answer will be in the negative ; ask him next what 
it is in this world which affords him thy most delightful enjoy- 
ment; he will answer, "Music; nothing," he will tell you ; 
u electrifies all the faculties of my soul like the melodious ac- 
cents of the human voice, united with the sound of instru- 
ments ) it is to me the most lively pleasure ; it is then only 
that I enjoy life in fulness.' 1 Interrupt him quickly, (for this 
subject being inexhaustible, he knows not when to stop,) and 
say to him, " You love it well, my dear friend, and when you 
think of the other life, you hope your soul will be happy 
there. You do not know, it is true, in what its happiness will 
consist ; but I ask you, can it be happy if deprived of a con- 
course of sweet sounds'?" At these words you will see him 
hang his head and reflect. Continue : u If the good man must 
live happy in the other life, and you do not doubt that, God is 
too just to deprive him of what constituted the charm of his 
life ; and as God must have foreseen everything, should there 
have been upon the earth but one single musician, a good man, 
the divine justice would have provided for him, in his immor- 
tal existence, those innocent pleasures which were here the re- 
creation of his earthly existence.*'' Your friend, whom these 

9* 



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words will relieve from the painful reflections into which yon 
had first plunged him, will then raise his head with an air of 
satisfaction, and say: " You are right • why should there not 
be music and singing in the other life ? The Grecian philoso- 
phers thought that music prevailed in heaven, and constituted 
the principal amusement of the Gods and virtuous souls ; and 
do not our theologians speak of choirs of angels?" "This is 
true,' 7 you will reply, "but I would have you to observe, that 
without an atmosphere it is impossible there should be sounds. 
And these accents of the human voice which you prefer to the 
sounds of all instruments, how could they be produced if souls 
do not speak, at least, if they do not sing ? And how could 
they sing if they had not a spiritual body, and if they were 
not surrounded with an immaterial atmosphere? And your 
own soul, how will it be possible to hear sounds, if it has 
neither substance nor form, as from your philosophical princi- 
ples you believe?" Do not press him further ) tell him to 
compare these principles, of which he seems so proud, with 
those whose simple enunciation has almost made you pass for 
a fool in his eyes ; and, if after having maturely reflected upon 
spiritual substances and forms, upon the existence of the soul in 
a human form, arid concerning immaterial atmospheres, he 
still persists in his principles, of which I doubt, he will respect 
yours, and never permit himself again to laugh at them. 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER XIV. 

Let us continue, my dear sir, our examination of questions 
of detail. 

In the preceding letters, we have taken man at his depar- 
ture from the world and introduced him into the spiritual 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



201 



world. You have seen him, in the midst of spirits, speaking 
their language without having learned it ; associating with 
those whose character has some analogy with his own, and 
preserving, as in our world, his individuality by means of a 
human form which, being proper to him, thus distinguishes 
him from all other spirits. Let us now enquire what this form 
is, and first see if it is the same as that which he had at his 
departure from our world. 

As the other life is a continuation of this, and death is 
merely a passage from one world into another, the first mo- 
ments of a new existence must be conformable to the last mo- 
ments of the preceding. You recollect besides, that there is 
a gradation in everything which is subject to the Divine Or- 
der, as well in the spiritual as in the material universe, 
Man entering into the other life preserves then the physiog- 
nomy hy which he was known in the world : the infant enters 
an infant ) the young man with all the freshness of youth ; the 
old man with all his wrinkles and frailty : and this, because 
man, as a spirit, though divested of his imaterial body, is then 
in the exteriors of his spiritual body. But he does not always 
remain in those exteriors : he by degrees puts off this second 
clothing of his real spiritual body and retains no more traces 
of it when he leaves the world of spirits, whether to enter into 
heaven, or to precipitate himself into hell. (See the 10th let- 
ter). Thus during this new phasis of his life, man is prepar* 
ing to manifest the interiors of his spirit, and his countenance 
becoming by degrees the mirror of his affections, or rather of 
his ruling love, which always tends to development, his phy- 
siognomy must appear more and more beautiful, if his ruling 
love is good, and more and more deformed if his ruling love 
is bad. All this evidently results from principles previously 
established. 

But here a question arises which you would certainly pre- 
sent, if I should pass by it in silence, for it is very rare that it 



202 



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is not addressed to us when we are speaking of the mode of 
existence in the other world. Do ice there become young 
again? exclaim almost always with eagerness those who have 
passed the spring time of life. 

This question is not resolved by what precedes ; for from 
the circumstance that the physiognomy of man will become 
more and more beautiful, it does not follow that he will him- 
self again return to the flower of youth. Thus to speak only 
of the old man. all that results from what has been said is. that 
the old man whose ruling love is good, will, in the other life, 
be a beautiful old man, and possess the tastes and inclinations 
of a wise old man ; but the question is repeated, will he again 
become young with the tastes and inclinations of youth ? 

The reply, which we make in the affirmative, generally 
pleases those who interrogate us. because there are so few who 
do not regret their youthful age ) but the greater part, not 
contented with this simple answer alone, enquire further, how 
such a transformation can be effected. As I do not believe 
that you are a man to be contented with a simple yes. I will 
explain how. in the spiritual world, the old man can become a 
young man. 

But, previously, permit me to make some reflections. They 
will lead us to establish first, that although, in our world, man 
grows old, it cannot be the same with him in the spiritual 
world. Like ail the bodies of the animal and vegetable king- 
doms, the human body, after having reached its maximum of 
youth and strength, enters upon a period of decay which ter- 
minates in a complete dissolution. Such is the law of natural 
order. The aged never return to their youth, and the virtue of 
the fountain of youth exist only in the writings of poets, and 
the imagination of some superstitious persons. 

How many regrets this law of natural order every day ex- 
cites ! how many complaints it continually gives rise to ! and 
yet it is altogether conformable to the love and wisdom of the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



203 



Creator. Consider what would have happened, if it had been 
possible for man to be always young and live eternally upon 
this earth, and you will readily acknowledge that this law of 
natural order, which excites so many murmurs, proves also, 
like all his other laws, the merciful views of .God towards the 
human race. 

Our globe renews its inhabitants three or four times in an 
age, and yet some are apprehensive that it may become too 
populous ! And statistics prove that the eartb would be very 
soon unable to nourish its inhabitants, if the population con- 
tinued to follow its increasing progression. What then would 
have happened if man had not been subject to natural death ? 
A consequence of this terrestrial immortality would inevitably 
have been a limitation as to numbers ) and already thousands 
of years would have passed since the closing of the list. There 
would have been no more births from that time. Imagine 
then the earth covered with inhabitants, the youngest of which 
would be many thousand years old : admit further, according 
to our supposition, that they all remained in the prime of life, 
and tell me if, in that case, from the nature of the human heart 
which under the penalty of satiety demands a continual varie- 
ty in all things, the terrestrial immortality of these men would 
not have become a burden to them ? 

Besides, if it had been thus, the infinity of God would no 
longer be manifested in his works ) for the limitation of the 
number of men upon the terrestrial globe would have been a 
proof of the limitation of his power. God being infinite, all 
things produced must be unlimited, or in other words, the in- 
finity of God must manifest itself in creation by indefinites. 
Now, in order that indefinites may exist in the natural uni- 
verse, which is subject to the laws of space and time, it is ab- 
solutely necessary that all the bodies of the vegetable and an« 
imal kingdoms, to give place to others, should successively 
pass through periods of growth and decay. 



204 



LETTER? TO A 



It was then conformable to the ]ove and wisdom of God, that 
man, for whom the universe was created, should be but a so- 
journer upon this material earth, whose limits are fixed and in- 
variable, and that he should only enjoy immortality — his in- 
contestable heritage, as a creature in the image and likeness of 
God — on a spiritual earth, unlimited as all that is independent 
of time and space, and consequently capable of receiving to all 
eternity the generations that will successively pass on our 
globe. 

In what blindness then are they, whose greatest desire is to 
live eternally in our world, and who blaspheme the Divinity, 
by murmuring against* that law which subjects man to natural 
death ? They thus abuse that conservative instinct which God 
has impressed upon the heart of man, and which makes him 
dread death. If it is the will of God that man should be, by 
an irresistible attraction, attached to his existence here below, 
it is because man has a function to perform upon this earth, as 
well for his own interest as for the accomplishment of the de- 
signs of the Divinity towards the human race in general. In 
impressing upon man the fear of death, it is the will of God, 
without however forcing his liberty, to prevent him as far pos- 
sible from arrogating to himself the right of discontinuing this 
function, and thus opposing his merciful views. Without this 
fear of death, would the religious principle, which classes su v 
icide among the most enormous crimes, be strong enough to 
prevent men from precipitating themselves in crowds into the 
other life ? and what then would become of the plans of the 
Divine Providence ? In fearing death, we do but obey the laws 
of order, and so long as our fear does not surpass our confidence 
in the divine mercy, it is moderated, and does not produce any 
prejudicial effect, because we remain in order; but in the con- 
trary case, it renders us unhappy, because in thus abusing the 
conservative instinct, we are in order no longer. 

Man being merely a passenger upon this earth, it is by nat- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



205 



ural death that he should leave it ) for violent and premature 
deaths are only exceptional cases; it is necessary then that his 
material body, after having attained, by an ascending progres- 
sion its maximum of strength, should retrogade to the last degree 
of decay, by passing successively through the periods of in- 
fancy, youth, manhood, old age and decrepitude. In short, 
man grows old in our world, because it is necessary that he 
should leave it. 

But should it be the same with him in the spiritual world ? 
Why should he grow old there since he is to remain there 
eternally ? The cause ceasing, the effect must disappear. It 
is true that the world of spirits is itself but a preparatory state, 
and man must also leave it to enter into his definitive spiritual 
state ) but this new passage cannot be compared, upon this 
point, with the first ; it is the passage from one spiritual state 
to another spiritual state, and not from a place to a spiritual 
state, such as is the passage which it performed by natural 
death. Besides, you will presently acknowledge, that to effect 
this new passage, far from being obliged to grow old, the spirit 
on the contrary must resume all its powers. 

I come now to our question : How does man become young 
again in the spiritual world? To render this discussion more 
clear, let us have recourse to examples. 

Let us take, for the first example, an old man whose ruling 
love is good. On leaving our earth, this old man enters into 
the world of spirits with his own physiognomy : his dotage, the 
tastes and inclinations of old age follow him there, as he is 
then in all the exteriors of his spirit ) in a word, he would be- 
lieve himself still upon our earth, if where he now lives he 
were not deprived of the sight of persons whom he has left in 
our world, and if he did not see some of those who have pre- 
ceded him into the other life. 

In his new dwelling place, what will become of his feeble 
spiritual body? The analogy whif;h exists between the 



206 



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laws of natural order and those of spiritual order will inform 
us. 

You are not ignorant that, in our world, the material body 
is at every instant subject to changes; they are insensible, it 
is true, but they are not the less real ; and strictly speaking, it 
may be said, that our body of to-day is not identically the same 
which we had yesterday. You know also that these changes 
are owing to the continual loss which the body sustains in its 
exercise, and to the reparations which it continually receives 
from the atmosphere which surrounds it, and the aliments by 
which it is nourished. 

Why should it be otherwise with the spiritual body in the 
world of spirits'? Is not this body organized spiritually, 
as ours is materially % Does it not live upon an earth like ours, 
covered also with productions and surrounded with atmos- 
pheres 1 Why should it not exercise the same functions, and 
be subject to continual changes in consequence also of loss and 
reparations ? 

But, you will say, that by these successive changes, in this 
world, we become old, while in the other, on the contrary, if 
we enter there old, we shall become young ; whence this man- 
ifest opposition % It proceeds from the characteristic differ- 
ence of the two worlds. Here we live in time, we must there- 
fore be subject to the laws of time ; thence the successive pe- 
riods which we call ages of life. In the other world, on the 
contrary, as we are completely set free from the laws of time, 
these periods or ages of life disappear and are succeeded by 
states. Created in the image and likeness of God, who is Very 
Man, our normal state must be that of a man, and not that of 
an infant with whom the constitutive faculties of man are not 
yet developed, nor that of an old man with whom these facul- 
ties have been blunted. Nevertheless, as all that proceeds 
from order is effected, as we have seen, without violence, those 
who enter as infants or old men, into the other life cannot but 



MAN. OF THE WORLD. 



207 



by degress attain to the state of man, the one by increasing in 
stature and the other by growing young again. This is the 
principle. Let us return now to our old man, and to analogy, 
and we shall be able to discover how such a change is effect- 
ed. You know that man is continually governed by his ruling 
love, and that in the other life this love remains eternally, with- 
out the possibility of its ever being changed. As the ruling 
love of our old man is good, this love must remove succes- 
sively from his heart all the bad affections which still beset it, 
thus this old man, although still retaining the tastes and incli- 
nations, which he had when leaving our world, begins, from 
the moment of his entrance into the other life, to profit by the 
new lights which he has there acquired, to discriminate atten- 
tively between the good and evil, and the true and the false : 
it is thus that he is able to struggle against his bad affections 
and to root out his errors. He chooses with care his societies, 
and seeks principally the company of old men, who are in a 
spiritual state in affinity with his own. Then the air which 
he breathes becomes more and more pure, the food with which 
he is nourished becomes more and more healthy. 

Here you would no doubt stop me to enquire if I make use 
of a figure when I speak of food in the spiritual world. No, 
my dear sir, I am not speaking figuratively, but really of the 
thing itself. And why should you be astonished that they, eat 
and drink in the spiritual world, since you admit that they 
breathe there? Why cry out against the word substan- 
tial food, since you admit in the other world earths, animals 
of all kinds, fields with their crops, gardens with their fruit 
trees, and in a word, all that exists in our world ? As the man- 
spirit has a spiritual body, is it not necessary that it should be 
nourished % And how could he nourish it if he did not make 
use of the products of the spiritual earth which he inhabits % 
But, you will answer, " If I have admitted all these things, it is 
only, in regard to spirits, as correspondences of their affections 



208 



LETTERS TO A 



and thoughts, and I supposed that the nourishment of the man 
spirit consisted in good affections and true thoughts, if he 
was good : in bad affections and false thoughts, if he was 
wicked." Well, it is just so that I understand it ; but observe, 
I pray you, that it is a principle that every interior act man- 
ifests itself by an exterior act which corresponds to it. With- 
out this manifestation, the spiritual world would no longer be 
a world, and we would then fall into the systems of philoso- 
phers and theologians who, by idealizing the other life, have 
presented to men upon this subject ideas absolutely chimeri- 
cal, and consequently inadmissible, which is the reason why 
there are so few persons now who believe in the existence of 
man after death. You had consequently adopted only the in- 
terior part of the fact, and entirely overlooked its exterior part. 
The man-spirit, it is true, is nourished interiorly with affec- 
tions and thoughts ) but as the affections and thoughts are real 
things, having substance and form, and not imaginary entities, 
as philosophy pretends, and besides, as the spiritual world, 
though within the man-spirit, is nevertheless manifested ex- 
teriorly to the eyes of his spiritual body, as I have explained 
to you in my ninth letter, it is thence altogether evident that 
the affections and thoughts with which the man-spirit is nour- 
ished interiorly, manifest themselves exteriorly in palpable 
aliment with which he nourishes his spiritual body, absolutely 
in the same manner as we nourish our material bodies on this 
earth. 

I have said, before this new digression, that by degrees our 
old man breathes a purer air, nourishes himself with healthier 
aliments : he breathes a purer air, because the spiritual atmos- 
phere which surrounds spirits always corresponds to their 
present state ) it becomes then purer for him in the degree 
that he lives in society with more upright spirits : he nourishes 
himself with healthier aliments, for the aliments with which 
spirits nourish their bodies, always correspond to their arTec- 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



209 



tions and thoughts at the moment; the solid aliments to their 
affections, and the liquid aliments to their thoughts ; they be- 
come then healthier for him in the degree that his ruling love 
removes the bad affections and false thoughts. Thus his spir- 
itual body, at first frail, will by degrees resume strength and 
his strength will be always increasing, because his affections 
will be always better and his thoughts always more beautiful. 
Add to this, that man takes with him into the other world, all 
his memory, and that it is only necessary for him to think of 
any fact whatever of his natural life, to reproduce all the circum- 
stances which accompanied it in their least details, (13th let- 
ter,) and you will see that our old man must pass, in the world 
of spirits, through states analogous to those of his terrestrial life ) 
but as his ruling love is good, he will reject with disgust those 
which were impregnated with evil and the false, and be de- 
lighted with those which included the good and the true. 

All that precedes is, besides, conformable to the general 
principles which we have previously discussed. You know 
that in the whole spiritual world there exist, properly speak- 
ing, only affections and thoughts; that these affections are 
good or bad, and these thoughts beautiful or deformed ; that 
the good affections and beautiful thoughts proceed from good 
itself and truth itself ; and deformed affections and thoughts 
proceed from the evil itself and the false itself, which have 
been introduced by the fall; that all the innumerable objects, 
which specially constitute the world of spirits, or the interme-. 
diate world, are but various combinations of good and bad af- 
fections, of true and false thoughts, and that all these objects 
are themselves modified in their substance and form, by reason 
of the modifications which the affections and thoughts un- 
dergo, of which they are the exterior representations. 

Apply these principles to the body of the spirit, and you will 
see that, simpxy a receptacle as the spirit itself is, of which it 
is the exterior manifestation, this body should be modified ac- 



LETTERS TO A 



cording as the spirit receives and appropriates good or evil, 
the true or the false, or in other words, according as the spirit 
receives and appropriates good or bad affections, true or false 
thoughts : and then you will be forced to conclude that the 
spiritual body of the man-spirit whose ruling love is good, 
must be continually strengthened, will become more and more 
lovely in the intermediate world, until a degree of perfection is 
attained which will permit the spirit to enter heaven and become 
an angel. 

Thus, our old man will not only become young again, but 
he will besides partake of all that constitutes the beauty of a 
young man, whatever may have been his visage or the con- 
formation of his body when living in our world. 

This conclusion might give rise to an objection which it is 
expedient to meet at once : If man, in the world of spirits, be- 
comes so different from what he was on the earth, how can 
we, on entering that world, recognize those who have gone 
there long before us? The answer is easy : Although the face 
may have undergone many modifications, it ordinarily pre- 
serves some characteristic feature ; and in most cases, it hap- 
pens there, what is very often observed on this earth, that they 
recognize one another after a few seconds examination. If, 
however the inspection of the face were not enough, as spirits 
retain all their memory, and recall to their minds all the events 
of their earthly life, better than on earth, (13th letter,) it be- 
comes easy for them to prove their identity, by citing the most 
minute details of facts which passed between them in our 
world. 

Let us take for a second example an old man whose ruling 
love is bad. Entering into the world of spirits, he also retains 
his physiognomy, his decrepitude, his inclinations and tastes, 
as he is in the exteriors of his spirit. His ruling love which 
is bad, must remove successively from his heart all the good 
affections which yet- remain ; thus also on his arrival, this old 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



211 



man, far from struggling against his bad passions, and seeking 
to root out his errors, begins on the contrary, to take a disgust 
at good affections and to ridicule the truths which he had in 
his memory : he disdains the society of old men who act and 
speak with wisdom, and seeks the company of those who are 
in a spiritual state in affinity with his own. 

While this old man lived in our world, his bad passions had 
been for the most part deadened, so to speak, by the frailty of 
the material body, whose worn out wheel-work yields with 
difficulty to the impulse which comes from the interior ) but 
when he is disengaged from this material body, they gradually 
resume some strength, and afterwards become more and more 
active, in the degree that his ruling love removes the few 
good affections which remain with him. Thus the air which 
he breathes becomes heavier, the aliments with which he is 
nourished become more and more gross; but nevertheless his 
spiritual body, at first feeble, continually gains strength, for 
his affections becoming more and more violent and his thoughts 
more and more deformed, the spiritual body, which is nothing 
but their exterior manifestation, becomes for that very reason 
so much the stronger. This old man then also becomes 
young again ; but far from manifesting the freshness of youth, 
he becomes more and more hideous, and when at last their no 
longer remains in him any good affection, nor any true 
thought, he precipitates himself into hell and becomes a 
devil. 

From all that precedes, you see that we become young again 
in the other life. I could, it is true, have confined myself in 
this discussion to presenting to you the principle, that is to 
eay, to supporting myself only upon the characteristic differ- 
ence of the two worlds ; for it is very evident that old age, 
being an accident inherent in time and matter, must be dissi« 
pated when we are disengaged from the laws which govern 
matter and time. But, as in this letter I have entered into 



212 



LETTERS TO A 



particulars concerning the world of spirits, I have dwelt upon 
the subject in corroborating the principle by all the considera- 
tions which I have just presented to you. 

To complete this picture, it is expedient to add a few words 
on the subject of the child who enters into the other life. 
You have already seen that it there becomes a man, and this, 
on the sole consideration that God being Very Man, and hav- 
ing created man in his image and likeness, to people the spir- 
itual world, the normal state of the spirit must necessarily be 
the state of complete man. You have seen also, that the child 
does not attain to man's estate but by degrees, and in a man- 
ner analogous to the growth of the child in our world, and this 
because in all that depends upon order there is gradation ; and 
no violent interruption. I will only add that all those who die 
before they have enjoyed liberty and rationality in our world — 
faculties which alone render man spiritually responsible for 
his actions — are all without an exception taken to heaven and 
become angels, when they have by degrees attained to the 
state of complete manhood. As to the manner in which the 
infant increases in stature in the spiritual world, to explain this 
to you, it would be necessary to enter into developments, 
which you will find in the treatise of Swedenborg concerning 
Heaven and Hell, and principally in his posthumous treatise 
concerning the Divine Love and the Divine Wisdom, where he 
enters into the most profound and most interesting details con- 
cerning the formation of man. 

My letters having at length induced you to undertake the 
reading of the works of Swedenborg, which treat particularly 
of the spiritual world, it is unnecessary now for me to enter 
into other details which relate to that world ) you will find in 
these works all that you can desire to know, and your convic- 
tion, already formed, cannot but be more and more corroborated 
by the studies in which you are about to engage. 

But, my dear sir, I have hitherto only fulfilled for you the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 213 

least difficult part of my task. I promised to explain to you 
the doctrines of the True Christian Religion, after you have un- 
derstood and admitted the principles of true religious philoso 
phy. I am far from retracting my promise ; but, though you 
now acknowledge these principles, and how r ever strong may be 
your desire to proceed to the investigation of these doctrines 
without delay, the exposition of them cannot hxnvever be pre- 
sented to you, until after a new preparation, which will oblige 
me to enter into extensive developments. You are aware that 
all the doctrines of Christianity repose upon what are com- 
monly called the Sacred Books, or Sacred Scriptures, which 
we by a single expression call the Word. Now, on the sub- 
ject of the Sacred Scriptures or the Word, you have, like all 
men of the world, a crowd of prejudices, which it is indispen- 
sable to root out. Though you may have preserved for it 
some of that respect which you were accustomed to pay to it 
in your childhood, you are far from having the conviction that 
it is divine in all its parts : and yet this conviction is abso- 
lutely necessary; it is consequently necessary to make it pen- 
etrate deep into your heart before I attempt to explain to you 
its doctrines. 

This is the task which I am about to undertake in a second 
series of letters. Accept, &c. 

10 



LETTERS 



TO A MAN OF THE WORLD. 

SECOND SERIES. 



LETTER I. 

You were conscious, my dear sir, at the commencement of oui 
correspondence, of a deep necessity of believing. Weary of an 
incessant whirl in the empty void of our philosophers, and 
scarcely gaining a glimpse of any foundation on which to stand, 
you at length became convinced of the nothingness of their 
systems; but though always on your guard against the doc- 
trines of the theologians, who carry written on their banners, 
" Shut your eyes and believe," yet you knew not how to escape 
from your painful position. You desired to believe, it is true, 
but you wished your eyes to remain open, and on no account 
would you consent to their being bandaged • you felt yourself, 
therefore, but little disposed to return to the religious beliefs in- 
culcated upon your childhood, and which you put away imme- 
diately upon your entrance upon the world ) thus, despite of 
your earnest desire, you saw yourself reduced solely to the be- 
lief in a God, the Creator of the universe, and still, how vague 
was this belief, when you found yourself unable to form any 
idea of this God ! It was then that, having heard mention made 
of the doctrines of the New Jerusalem, you evinced a determi- 
nation to become acquainted with them, and for that purpose 
saw fit to address yourself to me. If I have been agreeably 
surprised at your application, I have, on the other hand, con- 
sidered it a duty to respond to so laudable a wish, and have 



216 



LETTERS TO A 



therefore been prompt to enter upon the exposition which you 
desired, endeavoring at all times to adapt myself to the present 
state of your mind, that is to say, to develope first in order those 
propositions which it would be most easy for you to admit. 

Although I have as yet brought to view but a small part of 
the sublime truths revealed by Swedenborg, yet your position 
has already become essentially altered ; your belief in God has 
risen from its former vagueness to the strength of a firm convic- 
tion, and, to say nothing of the great number of truths you have 
admitted, you have heard also that man in dying continues still 
to be a man, and merely passes from one world into another, 
altogether as real and even more real than the former. Here, 
then, are certainly two points of belief, which, of themselves 
alone, ought to effect a happy revolution in all your ideas, and 
I am not therefore at all surprised by the intimation, that you 
have experienced an inward satisfaction and joy of which you 
had never before been conscious. Still it is not this which has 
afforded me the most pleasure on your account ; to believe in 
God and in the immortality of the soul is, it is true, something ; 
but this something is reduced to near nothing, provided one goes 
no farther. The circumstance which affords me most pleasure 
is, to have become apprised of the fact that you are now con- 
scious of an inward want no less urgent than the former. Your 
first want was to believe ; that which you now feel is, to become 
really a Christian. You have been struck with certain ideas 
which I have presented to you on the subject of the Trinity, 
and of Redemption; and now that you have learned 4 that true 
Christianity acknowledges but one only God in the single Per- 
son of the Lord Jesus Christ, you experience a lively desire to 
arrive at the knowledge of this One True God. There is here, 
my dear sir, a very important progress, on which I am im- 
pelled to congratulate you. 

But to attain to an interior conviction that the Lord is in- 
deed the Creator of the Universe, the Redeemer of men, and 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



21? 



their Regenerator— that is to say, the Father, Son, and Holy 
Spirit — you have still much ground to travel over ; for you 
have still many prejudices to overcome, many philosophical 
errors to extirpate, and a great number of truths to admit. We 
cannot advance otherwise than very slowly, for you, doubtless, 
desire that, in this second series, I should continue to follow 
the course adopted in the first ; that is to say, that I shall 
all along address myself to your intelligence, as is also my in- 
tention, The intelligence, or, rather, the understanding, is in 
fact, one of the two faculties which constitute man ; it is the 
torch which enlightens his will. Without intelligence man 
would not be man ; and to pretend that he is to forego the use 
of it, in dealing with religious questions, is to propose that man 
should renounce one of the most precious gifts of the Creator, 
that faculty which distinguishes him from the brutes, and by 
which alone he can know and admire his God. I shall, there- 
fore, be especially on my guard against demanding of you the 
sacrifice of your intelligence ; yet, as the intimate conviction 
that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only God of the universe 
springs from genuine faith, this is the moment for recalling to 
your recollection certain expressions in my First Letter, on the 
subject of the conviction which one acquires by reasoning : "Be 
it well remembered that, however strong this conviction may 
be, nevertheless it will not be faith ; but it will conduct you to 
the faith which God alone gives to man, when man is prepared 
to receive it." 

Thus you have been already instructed that there is a dis- 
tinction to be made between a conviction acquired by reasoning, 
and to which the name of faith is often given, and the true faith 
which the Lord alone bestows upon man. In the position which 
you now occupy, with the precautions that ought still to abide 
with you, it is evidently needful that you first acquire, by hu- 
man means, a strong conviction before you will be able to receive 
a true faith. This faith is not given arbitrarily, nor in an instant, 

10 



218 



LETTERS TO A 



as many suppose. Those who think to have thus received faith 
are in the greatest delusion, and have only an enthusiastic faith, 
which is therefore rather injurious than advantageous to them, 
because it does not come to them of the Lord. God never de- 
parts from the laws of his Divine Order, which are the laws of 
eternal justice ; but the first notions of human justice, which is 
merely a reflection of the Divine Justice, do they not declare that 
a father would be unjust who should distribute arbitrarily his 
goods among his children % How, then, can we suppose that 
God, who is Justice itself and the common Father of men, should 
arbitrarily bestow faith % If faith could be given without some 
kind of co-operation on the part of man, He would certainly give 
it to all without exception. As to the conditions in which man 
ought to be, in order to be enabled to receive true faith, you 
will see very soon, that they lie principally in his interior life, 
or, what is the same thing, in the love which directs his actions ; 
so far as man remains in the love of self, it is impossible for him 
to obtain true faith, but the moment that he compels himself to 
resist this love, and to live devoutly, he becomes capable of re- 
ceiving it. 

Nevertheless, true faith, of which the principal point consists 
in the recognition of the Lord Jesus Christ as the God who has 
created the universe, — this faith, I say, cannot be received by 
man unless he believes sincerely in the Divinity of the Sacred 
Scripture, or of the Word ; and it is on this account that this 
series of letters will be, as I have already intimated, devoted to 
proving that the Word is divine in every part. 

But since, in the position in which you now stand, it is neces- 
sary that you acquire a strong conviction, before hoping to 
attain a true faith, I am in duty bound to neglect no means 
which may at present tend to prepare you for this result ; I shall, 
with this view, submit to your notice certain passages of Swe- 
denborg, taken from the Arcana C&lestia : you will then see 
that, although man is not interdicted the use of his intelligence 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



21S 



while dealing with the doctrine of faith, it is at least necessary 
that he should be interiorly in a suitable state ; as otherwise the 
use that he makes of his intelligence, far from benefitting, will 
be positively injurious to him. I earnestly solicit your whole 
attention to these passages ; you will meet in them, it is true, 
certain new terms, or terms taken in a new sense ; but in the 
main they so carry their import with them, that you will have 
little difficulty in grasping it. Swedenborg as is permitted in every 
new science, has had recourse to neology, but still without in 
the least abusing it ; and, if you will allow this slight digression, 
I would add, that it is important to consecrate these new terms 
in our modern languages, and to endeavor even, at all times, 
to translate them literally ; to allow the least paraphrase in the 
text would be to incur the risk of misconstruction * there is not, 
in fact, a single word in the writings of Swedenborg which does 
not suit its place, and for which another could well be substi- 
tuted, for he always employs the proper term. 

" To respect the doctrine of faith," cays Swedenborg, " from 
rationals, is very different from respecting rationals from the 
doctrine of faith ; to respect the doctrine of faith from rationals, 
is not to believe the Word, or doctrine thence deduced, be- 
fore there is a persuasion wrought from rationals that it is true 5 
whereas to respect rationals from the doctrine of faith, is first 
to believe the Word, or doctrine thence, and afterwards to con- 
firm the same by rationals ; the former case is inverted order, 
and effects that nothing is believed, but the latter case is genuine 
order, and effects a better belief. 

" There are, therefore, two principles, one which leads to all 
folly and madness, another which leads to all intelligence and 
wisdom ; the former principle is to deny all things, as when a man 
says in his heart that he cannot believe such things, until he is 
convinced by what he can comprehend, or be sensible of ; this 
principle is what leads to all folly and madness, and may be called 
the negative principle ; the other principle is to affirm the things 



220 



LETTERS TO A 



which are of doctrine from the Word, as when a man thinks and 
believes with himself that they are true because the Lord has 
said so ) this principle is what leads to all intelligence and wis- 
dom, and may be called the affirmative principle. They who 
think from the negative principle, the more they consult things 
rational, scientific, and philosophical, do but so much the more 
plunge themselves into darkness, till at length they come to deny 
all things; the reason is, because no one can from things inferior 
comprehend things superior, that is, things spiritual and celestial, 
still less things Divine, inasmuch as they transcend all under- 
standing ■ and moreover in such case, all things are involved in 
negatives from the principle : but, on the contrary, they whc 
think from the affirmative principle, may confirm themselves in 
things spiritual and celestial by whatever rationals, by what- 
ever scientifics, yea, by philosophical, as far as lies in their 
power, all such things being given them for confirmation, and 
affording them fuller ideas. Moreover, there are some persons, 
who are in doubt before they deny, and there are others, who 
are in doubt before they affirm ; they who are in doubt before 
they deny, are those who incline to a life of evil, and when this 
life bears them away, then as much as they think concerning 
things spiritual and celestial, so much they deny • but they who 
are in doubt before they affirm, are those who incline to a life 
of good, to which life when they suffer themselves to be bent by 
the Lord, then as much as they think concerning those things, 
so much they affirm them." A. C, n. 2568. 

" They who are in the negative principle in regard to the truth 
of what is in the Word, saying in their hearts, that they will then 
believe, when they are persuaded by rationals and scientifics, 
are in such a state, that they never believe, not even when con- 
vinced by the sensuals of the body, as by the sight, the hearing, 
and the touch, for they always frame new reasonings against 
such convictions, whereby at length they totally extinguish all 
faith, and at the same time turn the light of the rational into dark- 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



221 



ness, because into falses. But they who are in the affirmative 
principle, that is, who believe what is in the Word to he true, 
because the Lord has declared it, are in such a state that by ra- 
tional and scientifics, yea by sensuals, they are continually con- 
firmed and their ideas illustrated and corroborated ; this is the 
case with every one who is in the affirmative principle, for man 
has light from no other source than by means of rationals and 
scientifics." — A. C, n. 2588. • 

Swedenborg gives, in the same article, a number of illustrative 
examples ; I will transcribe only one of them. 

According to the doctrine of the " Word, the first and princi- 
pal thing of doctrine'is love to the Lord and charity towards the 
neighbor ; they who are in the affirmative in this, may enter into 
whatever rationals and scientifics, yea, sensuals, they please? 
every one according to his gift, his science, and his experience, 
yea, the more they enter, the more they are confirmed, for uni- 
versal nature is full of confirmation. But they who deny this 
first and principal of doctrine, and wish first to be convinced 
that it is so, by scientifics and rationals, never suffer themselves 
to be convinced, because they deny in heart, and continually in- 
sist on some other principle, which they believe essential : at 
length by confirmations of their own principle, they so blind 
themselves, that they cannot even know what love to the Lord 
is and what love towards the neighbor is ; and inasmuch as they 
confirm themselves in things contrary thereto, they also finally 
confirm themselves in this, that there cannot be any other love 
attended with delight, but the love of self and of the world, and 
their confirmation herein is such, that, if not in doctrine, yet in 
life, they embrace infernal love, instead of heavenly love. But 
with those, who are neither in the negative, nor in the affirma- 
tive, but in a doubting (principle) before they deny or affirm, the 
case is as was said above, n. 2568, viz., that they who incline 
to a life of evil, fall into the negative principle, but they who 
incline to a life of good, are led into the affirmative." 



222 



LETTERS TO A 



Your actual position, my dear sir, seems to me to be indicated 
with sufficient clearness in these passages. It is certain that you 
are not in the Affirmative on the subject of the Word, since you 
do not admit that it has been uttered by God himself. It is cer- 
tain also that you are not in the Negative, since, under the con- 
scious need of becoming really a Christian, you have reached 
the point of desiring to recognise the Divinity of the Word, 
which forms the basis of Christianity ; it is, therefore, the Dubi- 
tative position that you now occupy. If you were in doubt be- 
fore denial, I should anxiously avoid attempting to convince you 
of the Divinity of the Word, for in that case, I should be really 
culpable in directing your meditations to a subject like this, 
without any probability of success ; but as everything evinces 
that you* are in doubt before affirming, I do not hesitate to 
present to you the means of emerging from this doubt, and of 
arriving in the end at a complete conviction of the Divinity of 
the Word. 

I shall follow, then, in this new discussion, the course which 
I have all along adopted in the former. It is not by employing the 
common places of the old theology that one can hope to con- 
vince on this point a man of the world, as experience has but 
too well shown their utter impotency for such a purpose ; but 
the end may be gained by a successive development of the sub- 
lime truths revealed by Swedenborg. As to yourself, my dear 
sir, when you have learned these truths, you will believe in the 
Word, as you have believed in the God-Man ; as you have be- 
lieved in a soul in the human form ; in a word, as you have be- 
lieved in another world, composed of spiritual substances and 
forms. You will then be fully in the Affirmative principle, and 
you will be able, without difficulty or danger, to make use of the 
Rationals, Scientifics, and Philosophies, which will furnish you 
with new confirmatory proofs ; but in the mean time, while this 
process of conviction is going on, I have one thing to ask of you, 
and that for your own sake, which is, that you would unceas 



A MAN OF THE WORLD 223 

ingly bestow the greatest attention upon the subject matter oi 
tie various passages which I shall cite. 

Accept, &c 



LETTER II. 

If I have suffered a long time to elapse between my last letter 
and this, it is not, my dear sir, without a motive, as you may 
presume. Before entering upon a subject so important as that 
which is going to occupy our attention, it was the part of pru- 
dence to allow you time for mature reflection upon the passages 
of Swedenborg which I had cited. Everything proved to me, 
in truth, that you were rather in doubt before affirming, than in 
doubt before denying ; but, nevertheless, that the proof might be 
complete, I desired to receive from you a formal declaration. I 
have now, since, after sufficient examination, you have acknowl- 
edged yourself that you were led to the study of religious matters, 
not by mere curiosity, but by an urgent necessity of knowing 
your God, the most perfect conviction that you are in an affir- 
mative state, and hence am ready to enter with you upon the 
examination of the Bible, or the Word, in order to dissipate 
your doubts upon its sanctity, and to convince you that it is 
really the Word of God, and, consequently, Divine in all its parts. 

I will commence this examination by an expose of the Word, 
presenting it to you from the origin of all things, and giving you, 
so to speak, its history down to the present time. 

If you will recur to what was said upon the Creation in the 
preceding letters, you will find that the universe emanated from 
Divine Love, but that it is by Divine Wisdom that it was formed 
or created. This is still farther evident from the fact, that with- 
out the operation of Divine Wisdom the universe could not pos- 
10* 



224 



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sibly have existed ; for the emanations of Love could have been 
neither distinct nor varied : or, in other words, there would have 
been no objects, and, consequently, no creation, because there 
would have been no forms; it is Love that furnished the sub- 
stances, but it is by Wisdom that each substance was clothed 
with a form which constituted its existence ; thus the universe 
owes its being to Divine Love, and its existence to Divine 
Wisdom. ( 

Hence, when it is said in John i. 1, 3, — " In the beginning the 
Word was with God, and all things were made by It," it is very 
evident that by the Word nothing else is meant than the Divine 
Wisdom. 

The Word [La Parole], or Divine Wisdom, by which all 
things were made, is what the Greeks called Logos, the Latins, 
Verbum, and what is generally called, at the present day, the 
Word \le Verbe]. Taken in this sense, you can by no means 
doubt that the Word is Divine ) but when you consider the writ- 
ten Book, to which the name Word is given, you question with 
yourself its Divinity, because you do not seize upon the identity 
of this Book with the Word by which all things were created; 
and yet the identity is perfect, as you may be convinced by the 
sequel of this expose. 

Since the Word has caused the existence of the universe, or 
has created it, it is also the Word which causes it to subsist, or 
preserves it ; for preservation is perpetual creation, just as sub- 
sistence is perpetual existence. In order to preserve the uni- 
verse, the Word is everywhere in action, and in all things it 
acts according to the recipient, that is, according to the confor- 
mation of the thing which receives, and according to the use for 
which it was created ; viz. : in every object of the mineral king- 
dom, according to its form and its use, as also in every vegetable, 
in every animal, and likewise in man ; but with man, whose 
form is the image of God, and whose use is to become an angel 
of heaven, it acts with plenitude. 



MAiN OF THE WORLD. 



225 



In the earliest times, when everything was still in a state of 
integrity, the Word found nowhere the least obstacle to its re- 
ception, and everything then maintained itself in order ; the hu- 
man receptacles were continually open, and nothing prevented 
the Divine Wisdom from penetrating them. Men, thus directed 
by the Word, lived happily upon the earths by conforming them- 
selves to the laws of Divine Order, and when they laid aside 
their mortal bodies they found themselves immediately in the 
heavens. 

Such were the men upon our earth who constituted the Most 
Ancient Church, designated in Genesis under the name of Adam 
or Man. " In the Most Ancient Church," says Swedenborg, " the 
W ord was not written, but was revealed to every one who was 
of the church, for they were celestial men, thus in the perception 
of good and truth like the angels, with whom also they had fel- 
lowship ; thus they had the Word written in their hearts. And 
inasmuch as they were celestial, and in society with angels, all 
things which they saw and apprehended by any sense were to 
them representative and significative of things celestial and 
spiritual, which are in the Lord's kingdom ; so that they saw 
indeed worldly and terrestrial things with their eyes, or appre- 
hended them by their other senses, but from them and by them 
they thought concerning things celestial and spiritual : it was 
for this cause, and not otherwise, that they were able to speak 
with angels, for the things which are with the angels are celes- 
tial and spiritual, and when they present themselves to man, 
they fall into such things as are with man in the world. 7 ' — A 
C., n. 2896. 

You may readily obtain an account of the state of these men, 
if you will recur to what was said of the spirit of man, and of 
the correspondence of the things of the spiritual world with 
those of the natural world, in the preceding letters. You have 
seen there that man has in himself the spiritual world, and that 
this world is manifested exteriorly before him as often as his 



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spiritual man is open. Now, with the men of the Most Ancient 
Church, the spiritual man was constantly open, and it was for 
this cause that they were in society with the angels, not with 
all indiscriminately, hut with those who were at the moment in 
their spiritual man 3 hence they saw them face to face, as man 
in the world sees his fellow-man. When they conversed with 
them, the angels, who were not in the least occupied with worldly 
and terrestrial things, spake of celestial and spiritual things in 
angelic language which was entirely unintelligible to man 5 but, 
in consequence of the correspondence of the things of heaven 
with those of the earth, the expressions which they used were 
changed for man into analogous expressions concerning the 
world; and as man then understood correspondences perfectly, 
and consequently had a full understanding of representatives and 
significative s, he immediately apprehended in these worldly and 
terrestrial expressions the celestial and spiritual things which 
they contained. 

Thus, with these men of the Most Ancient Church, Divine 
Wisdom, which is the ensemble of all the laws of Divine order, 
was graven interiorly upon the depth of their heart, and inscribed 
exteriorly upon natural objects and natural events : entire nature 
was with them the book of God, or the representative theatre of 
the Lord's kingdom, and each object, each event, was a leaf of 
that admirable book in which they read fluently. That book, 
always displayed before their eyes and engraven upon their heart, 
was the Word, inasmuch as it contained the Divine Wisdom. 

If man had always remained in the state in which he was 
when the Most Ancient Church flourished, the operation of the 
Word would always have made itself felt in the same manner ; 
but man having been endowed with free-will, that is to say, with 
the liberty of following the laws of order or of breaking them, 
tiiere came a time when the men of the Most Ancient Church 
began to deviate from the laws of Divine Order; from that mo- 
ment the perception which they had of good and truth, anc 5 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



227 



which was to them the Word graven upon the heart, became 
less clear, for by infraction upon the laws of order their spirit- 
ual man became closed, and no longer afforded the same access 
to the Divine Wisdom ; and the more their descendants deviated 
from these laws, the more obscure their perception became ; 
until finally, this infraction having arrived at extremes, their 
spiritual man was entirely closed, the Divine Wisdom had no 
longer any way of entrance to them, and this most Ancient 
Church totally perished, which is represented in Genesis by the 
Deluge. 

The destruction of this church must necessarily have been 
followed by that of the entire human race, if the Lord had not 
instituted a new church, designated in Genesis by the name of 
Noah, which is called the Ancient Church, to distinguish it from 
the preceding. In fact, if the Word or Divine Wisdom did not 
penetrate men, or at least some of those constituted into a church, 
the human race could not possibly subsist ) for men would lose 
all idea of good and truth, of justice and equity, of honesty and 
decency ; they would act contrary to all the laws of Divine Or- 
der, and would finally become reduced to utter destruction. But 
the Lord never leaves men without a church, and when the last 
which He had instituted is destroyed, he institutes another, as 
will be shown in the sequel of this expose • for if the human 
race should entirely perish, as it is the only seminary of the 
heavens, it would follow that the heavens, — destined, by reason 
of the infinity of God, to receive perpetually and indefinitely 
new inhabitants, without ever being filled, — would receive no 
more, and would become limited in population ; which would 
be in manifest opposition with the love of God, for whom the 
natural world is only a means of indefinitely and perpetually 
creating beings capable of loving their Creator. Moreover, you 
have seen elsewhere that spiritual beings and men could not 
subsist without each other. 

In order that a new church might be instituted, it was nc« 



22S 



LETTERS TO A 



cessary that the Word should he received among some men 
who were less depraved than the rest ; but as the Word could not 
be engraven upon their heart, inasmuch as, — their spiritual man 
being closed, and the evil and the false operating against its being 
opened, — they could have no perception of the good and the true, 
it manifested itself to them by another kind of dictate, which 
may be called Conscience. Thus, instead of perception, they 
had conscience, which is comparatively very obscure, and in- 
stead of being celestial, like the men of the Most Ancient 
Church, they were spiritual : their state was entirely different 
from that of the most ancient people, for they had with heaven 
only a communication of which they had no knowledge. The 
Divine Wisdom, it is true, did not cease to be inscribed upon nat- 
ural objects, even in the least natural events ; for nature, on 
her part not vitiated by the fall of man, never ceased to be the 
representative theatre of the Lord's kingdom ; but the spiritual 
man being no longer open, and the Word manifesting itself no 
longer to the interiors, except by conscience, it was indispen- 
sably necessary that this new church, in order to be a guide 
for conscience, should have exteriorly a fixed rule ; then the 
Word [Verbe] became the written Word [Parole], without 
however ceasing to be the same [Word], that is, without ceas- 
ing to be the Divine Wisdom, as you will see. 

The Lord, in his foreknowledge of the fall of the celestial 
church, had provided the means of instituting a spiritual 
church ; and as the spiritual man, deprived of perception, could 
not be enlightened in the same manner as the celestial man, his 
Divine Providence had caused to be preserved, from the very 
commencement of the degradation of the Most Ancient Church, 
some doctrinals of faith and some revelations of that church fov 
the use of the new church. These doctrinals, at first collected 
by men designated in Genesis under the name of Cain, were 
put in reserve, that they might not be lost : this is what is 
meant when it is said, " that a mark was put upon Cain that no 



MAN OF THE WORLD 



229 



one might kill him." — iv. 15. At a later period representatives 
and significatives were collected into a compilation of doctrine 
by other men designated in Genesis under the name of Enoch ; 
and as this doctrine was to serve for posterity, and not to be 
used at that time, it is said that " God took Enoch." — v. 24. 

The written Word that was given to the Ancient Church was 
derived from this origin ; it was composed of recitals, all of 
which, even to the least word, were representative and signi- 
ficative of things celestial and spiritual, and, consequently, 
contained the laws of Divine Order. Thus the Word, instead 
of being read fluently ^couramment], as in the Most Ancient 
Church, upon the objects of nature and in natural events, was 
read in a compilation written according to the correspondences 
of the earth with heaven , it was therefore always the Divine 
Wisdom itself ) but that Divine Wisdom was found in a natural 
envelope, or, rather, it was, as an inestimable treasure, inclosed 
in a casket whose key was then in the hands of men ; the casket 
was the literal sense of the representatives and significatives, 
and the key the science of correspondences ; by this science, 
which was universally disseminated in the Ancient Church, the 
men of that church knew what the representatives and signifi- 
catives contained ; but they differed from the men of the Most 
Ancient Church, inasmuch as they had no perception of them, 
— they merely derived from them a doctrine for the guidance of 
their spiritual life. 

That you may have a better apprehension of this difference, 
I will quote the following passage from Swedenborg : — " To 
know by perception and to apprehend by doctrine are very dif- 
ferent things ; they who know by perception have no need of 
the knowledge acquired by means of systematized doctrines ; 
let us take an example which will illustrate this point ; he who 
knows how to think well has no occasion to be taught to think 
by any rules of art ; for in this way he would lose his faculty 
of thinking well, as is the case with those who grovel along in 



230 



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scholastic dust. Those who act from perception receive from 
the Lord the faculty of knowing by an internal way what is 
good and true, whilst those who act from doctrine derive their 
knowledge of such things through an external way, or by 
means of the corporeal senses ; the difference between these 
two ways is like that between light and shade. Moreover, the 
perceptions of the celestial man are wholly indescribable, for 
they extend to the most minute and particular things, with the 
greatest variety, according to states and circumstances." — A. C, 
n. 521. 

As regards this written Word of the Ancient Church, only a 
few fragments of it, which are found in the books of Moses, 
are known, for it was lost in the course of time j it consisted, 
like the Word of the Old and the New Testaments, of both his- 
torical and prophetical books ; the historical books being called 
the Wars of Jehovah, and the prophetical, the Enunciations. — 
Numb, xxi., 14, 27. Finally, the historical narrations, being 
written in the prophetical style, were factitious, for the most 
part, like those in Genesis from the 1st to the 11th chapter. — 
A. C.j n. 2897. 

The Ancient Church extended over the greater part of the 
globe, and flourished principally in Syria, the land of Canaan, 
Mesopotamia, Arabia, Chaldea, Assyria, Egypt, Nineveh, Tyre 
and Sidon. Whilst the men of that Church followed the laws 
of Order, they preserved the key of that Word ; that is, they 
knew by the science of correspondences what the representa- 
tives and significatives, of which it was composed, contained ; 
as these representatives and significatives contained Divine 
things, they were reduced among them into practice, and were 
applied to their Divine Worship ; and this was done that there 
might be a communication with heaven; since things in the 
world represent and signify analogous things in heaven. But 
from the moment the Ancients deviated from" the laws of Order, 
they departed from the true meaning of correspondences 3 and 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



231 



when they became entirely abandoned to the love of self and 
the world, the science of correspondences was lost, and theii 
worship became wholly idolatrous. 

At the fall of this Ancient Church men had become so exter- 
nal that it would have been impossible to institute a new church ) 
for they would have been incapable of comprehending the in- 
ternals of worship ) and even if they could have compre- 
hended them, they were in such a state of depravity, that they 
would have profaned them. At that time, that there might 
always be a communication between heaven and earth, and 
that by this means the human race might be preserved, the Lord 
instituted a representative of a church, and not a church, as is 
generally believed ; for that which causes a church to exist 
with man is the internal of worship, and the worship that was 
then established was entirely external, for reasons which I have 
just mentioned. Man could be brought back again into the 
internal of worship only when the Lord Himself should insti- 
tute a church by coming into the world ; because it was only by 
making Himself man that He could conquer the power of evil 
and falsity by subjugating the hells ; and the Lord was to come 
into the world only when man had fallen into the last state of 
degradation, that is, when from external-sensual, as he then 
was, he should become corporeal-sensual ) it was therefore to 
preserve the human race during this last period of degradation, 
that the Lord instituted a representative of a church. For this 
end He chose the Jewish nation, not because that nation was 
less corrupt than others, for the history of the Jews proves that 
they were as barbarous, and often more ferocious, than the 
neighboring nations ; but rather because, by the tenaciousness 
of their character, and by their national egotism, the Jews were 
better adapted to preserve untouched the depot of a new writ- 
ten Word. 

You will doubtless ask, Why a new Word, — since the Lord 
might, before the Ancient Church was entirely destroyed, have 



232 



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secured the Word, and at a later period have deposited it 
among the Jews, when the representative of a church should 
be instituted among them. I will reply by enlarging a little 
upon what I have just said, viz. : that the Lord, who is pre- 
science itself, knew that the representative of the church would 
have no more efficacy than the preceding churches for reinsta- 
ting the human race ; that He alone could reinstate them by 
coming himself into the world ; that according to the laws of 
his Divine Order, He must not come till the middle of the times 
[le milieu des temps], that is, till the human race, by success- 
ively declining, should become reduced to the last state of deg- 
radation ; that the middle of the times had not then arrived ; 
that it was indispensably necessary to provide, in the mean 
time, that the human race should not perish, by giving a Word 
that might be carefully preserved ; that if the Lord had caused 
the W ord of the Ancient Church to be deposited with the Jew- 
ish nation, or with any other nation, it could not long have 
existed, for no nation could have preserved it; because that, no 
one being capable of understanding the spiritual sense of it, 
the literal sense would have been without interest to them ; that 
then the loss of this Word would have been followed by that 
of the human race, since the Divine Wisdom having no further 
access to men, the communication of heaven with the earth 
would have been broken ; but that, on the contrary, by giving 
to the children of Jacob a new Word, whose external sense was 
conformable to their character and to their national egotism, it 
would be preserved by them with the greatest veneration till the 
appointed times. This is what took place ; in fact, this Word 
being destined, like the preceding, to be the bond of conjunc- 
tion between heaven and the human race, was entirely composed 
of representatives and significatives ; it was also, like the pre- 
ceding, divided into historical and prophetical books ; the his- 
torical relations anterior to Heber, or the father of the He- 
brews, are fictitious, like most of those of the Ancient Word; 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



233 



but those posterior to Heber are real. Now all these relations 
refer directly or indirectly to the Jewish nation, and, moreover, 
all the prophetical books treat, in the literal sense, of future 
events relative either to the principles of the nation or to the 
nation itself, and announce to them the most important desti- 
nies ; in fine, this Word, which, beginning from the creation, 
comes without interruption down to the time of Abraham, and 
afterwards traces their religious, political, and civil history, was 
to them a precious monument, of which they have always 
showed themselves very proud. All this may satisfy you why 
the Jews, men so attached by character to terrestrial things, 
have preserved this Word with so much fidelity and constancy, 
and, at the same time, why, by reason of the inherent tenacity 
of their nature, this Word has been intrusted to them in prefer- 
ence to any other nation. 

I shall have occasion, further on, to return to this subject, 
and to remove many objections by presenting to you the Jewish 
nation and the principal personages of the Bible under their 
true character * but for the present, to avoid digression, I will 
pursue my task by explaining to you the manner in which the 
Word has been transmitted. 

The spiritual man having been entirely closed with the people 
of the Most Ancient Church, there was no longer any open 
communication with heaven ; that is, men no longer conversed 
with angels, as at the time when that Church was in a flourish- 
ing state ; there was only a communication by means of the 
Word, but so obscure with man, that he had no knowledge of 
it. Such has been, since that epoch, the ordinary state of man 
upon this earth ; this state, which goes back anterior to the 
period of historical record, seems to be the normal state of the 
human race ; but it is, as you see, only a consequence of the 
degradation of man. The Lord cannot cause it to cease, 
although it may be very easy for Him to open the spiritual-man 
with all men, for the Lord can desire only the good of men, and 



234 



LETTER S TO A 



in the state in which they now are, if He opened their spiritua. 
man, He would precipitate them into evil • in fact, they are more 
in the love of self than in the love of God, and more in the, 
love of the world than in the love of the neighbor ; now, as 
the love of self is diabolic love, and the love of the world is 
satanic love, men would enter immediately into communication 
with diabolic and satanic spirits, and would disdain the society 
of angelic spirits. Nevertheless, although the spiritual man 
has been closed with all men, and notwithstanding the dangers 
of which I have just spoken, it has always been capable of 
being opened with some few of them, either when the Lord 
wished to transmit revelations for the church, — and then all 
dangers were carefully guarded against, — or when men, driven 
by an evil love, ardently desired to enter into communication 
with the other world, — and then they suffered the penalty of 
their audacity. Thus those with whom the spiritual man was 
open momentarily found themselves in communication with the 
beings of the spiritual world ; namely, either with angels, who 
most frequently announced themselves as being Jehovah, or 
with infernal spirits, who ordinarily assumed the appearance of 
angels of light, and presented themselves under diverse names, 
as being also gods. Hence the true and the false prophets, 
hence also Divine miracles and magic miracles. 

I have just said that angels announced themselves most fre- 
quently as being Jehovah ; this requires an explanation : before 
that Jehovah had made himself flesh, it was impossible for Him 
to communicate directly with his creatures, and to speak with 
them face to face ; you have seen the reasons for this in my 
12th letter, where it is treated concerning redemption : when, 
therefore, Jehovah wished to make revelations, he rilled 
an angel with His divinity, to the extent that the angel believed 
himself Jehovah, and remained in that belief until his commu- 
nication with man or with men had ceased. Thus it was always 
by the ministry of an angel that Jehovah spake with the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



235 



jrophets and other personages of the Bible ; for neither man 
nor angel has seen or can see Jehovah ; but since the Incar- 
nation, they can see the Lord, whose soul is Jehovah. 

You may already perceive by these details how the Word of 
the Old Testament was given : Moses, the Prophets, and in 
general those whom Jehovah employed to transmit to us the 
Word, were all, at the time, in communication with the spiritual 
world ) or, in other words, their spiritual man was then open. 
When they say, "Jehovah hath spoken to me," — " The Angel 
of Jehovah hath said to me," — " I saw, and behold," — etc.. — ■ 
such expressions show that they were not in the ordinary state. 
The beings and objects which they saw were spiritual beings 
and objects, and they saw them as distinctly as the natural man 
sees the natural beings and objects that surround him : for 
their spiritual man being open, they were really in the spir- 
itual world. The words which they heard were spiritual 
words which had reference only to celestial and spiritual things, 
and which on arriving within their hearing were changed into 
analogous expressions concerning the world. But when they 
wrote the Word, they wrote according to an inspiration coming 
from their interior • each phrase, each word, even to the least 
iota, was inspired into them ) there was absolutely nothing of 
man ; for what they wrote could be the Word only so far as all 
the literal or worldly expressions should be, without the least 
exception, in perfect correspondence with the celestial and spir- 
itual ideas which they were to represent. " This Word," says 
Swedenborg, " was written in like manner by representatives 
and signincatives, in order that it might contain in itself an in- 
ternal sense understood in heaven, and that there might thus be 
a communication by the Word, and that the Lord's kingdom in 
the heavens might be united to the Lord's kingdom upon the 
earth. Unless each of the things which are in the Word repre- 
sents, and each of the expressions by which the things have been 
traced signifies Divine things belonging to the Lord, consequently 



236 



LETTERS TO A 



celestial and spiritual things belonging to His kingdom, thu 
Word is not Divine ; and since the case is so, the Word could 
have been written in no other style, for it is by this style, and 
by no other, that human things and expressions correspond, even 
to the least jot, with celestial things and ideas ; hence it is, that 
if the Word be read only by a child, the Divine things which it 
contains are perceived by the angels." — A. C, n. 2899. 

You may see from this quotation what is the nature of this 
communication of heaven with the earth by the Word ; you know, 
from my preceding letters, that there are in every man beings of 
the spiritual world, namely, angels and devils, good spirits and 
evil spirits ) when therefore man reads the Word, the angels that 
are in him perceive the spiritual sense of it, and the good spirits 
understand it, and there is thus without his knowledge a com- 
munication of those angels and good spirits with him, which is 
a source of great spiritual advantage to him, if he is disposed to 
obey the interior impulse that results from it. 

This passage and that which precedes show also that the Word 
of the Old Testament has precisely the same characters as the 
first written Word ; and since the word of the Ancient Church 
was no other than the Word or the Divine Wisdom in a natural 
envelope, it follows that the Word [la Parole] of the Old Testa- 
ment is likewise the Word \le Verbe], or the Divine Wisdom. 

When the middle of the times arrived, or what is the same thing* 
when the human race, having become entirely corporeal-sen- 
sual, had fallen to the last state of spiritual degradation, Jehovah, 
came Himself into the world. This is not the time to explain the 
Incarnation • that grave subject will be treated upon when we 
discuss the question of doctrines ; but all that has been said thus 
far is sufficient to enable you to understand that Jehovah, in con- 
sequence of the incarnation, being the soul of Jesus Christ, the 
Divine Saviour, whilst He lived upon our earth, spake only ac- 
cording to the science of correspondences, for every expression 
that proceeded out of His mouth was at the same time intended 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



237 



both for the inhabitants of the heavens and the men to whom He 
addressed Himself ; and that thus whatever He pronounced was 
representative and significative of the celestial and spiritual 
things of His kingdom. 

When the- Lord had glorified or rendered Divine the Human, 
which He had assumed in the world for the purpose of living 
among men and performing the great work of Redemption, He 
desired that certain expressions which He had uttered by word 
of mouth, and certain actions of His life upon our earth, should 
be collected and transmitted to posterity as a new evidence of 
His mercy. Hence the Word of the New Testament, which was 
written in the same manner as that of the Old Testament * that 
is, each phrase and each word, even to the smallest iota, was in- 
spired, and in the Evangelists and in the Apocalypse there is 
absolutely nothing that was derived from man. Everything, 
therefore, is in like manner representative and significative of 
celestial and spiritual things of the Lord's kingdom, so that the 
Word \la Parole} of the New Testament is also the Word [le 
Verbe], or the Divine Wisdom. 

The question may here arise, why did the Lord, since the Word 
of the Old Testament was then in existence, and has always 
existed, give that of the New Testament % I will reply, by 
saying that the Lord having come into the world in the 
middle of the times, that is, at the epoch when humanity, 
having arrived at the last limit of the period of degeneration, 
was going to enter through Him into an ascending period of 
regeneration, it was indispensably necessary that the external 
worship instituted by the old Law in the representative of the 
Church for a nation entirely external, should be succeeded in 
the Christian Church by a worship whose internal should be 
the principal, which could be accomplished only by a new Law, 
I will also remind you that in His Word God always has re- 
gard to circumstances of time and place, and especially to the 

state of civilization and the character of the people to whom 

11 



238 



LETTERS TO A 



He addresses it ; that is, the celestial and spiritual things that 
are transmitted to them are clothed with representatives and 
significatives which are always conformable to the times and 
places, to their state of civilization, and to their character ; and 
this is so, in order that the Word may be more easily received. 
Thus the Word of the Old Testament, being addressed to the 
Jews, partakes of the ferocious and implacable character of 
that people ; and that of the New Testament, being destined for 
nations whose manners were become somewhat softened by 
reason of the new period upon which they were entering, is 
stamped with sentiments of benevolence and universal brother- 
hood. Moreover, I will add that the abrogation of that wor- 
ship does not affect at all the sanctity of the entire Word of the 
Old Testament ; for the external of the old law which is found 
to be abrogated by the new law, remains not the less, on that 
account, the Word of the Lord ; inasmuch as that external con- 
tains within it celestial and spiritual things which will exist 
forever. 

The institution of the Christian Church was therefore the 
point of departure of humanity in its ascending period ; but this 
Church, as is clearly announced in the Evangelists and in the 
Apocalypse, was itself to fall and to be replaced by a New Chris- 
tian Church, designated by the emblematical name of the New 
Jerusalem. This great event is being accomplished at the pres- 
ent day without the knowledge of a large majority of Chris- 
tians. 

This new fall, however, at a period announced as an ascend- 
ing one, seems to imply a contradiction, and must therefore be 
explained. 

When the Lord instituted the first Christian Church, he was 
obliged to take men just as they were, since he never forces 
their free-will ; now, when he gave the Word of the New Tes- 
tament, they were corporeal-sensual, as 1 have said ; if he had 
unfolded to them its internal sense, either they would not have 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



239 



admitted it, or they would have profaned it; and, in either case, 
they would have rejected the Word, and there would have heen 
no Christian Church. Thus, although this Word was more 
clear than that of the Old Testament, it must, in order to be re- 
ceived, remain sealed, as well as that of the Old Testament, 
until the internals contained within them could be compre- 
hended and accepted by men. It is true, that in this manner 
the Christian Church has fallen into the gravest heresies, and has 
gradually approached an entire state of devastation ; but its exist- 
ence and its fall have nevertheless been an advance, since the hu- 
manity of the present day is found capable of comprehending and 
of admitting a manifestation of the internals of the Word, or of 
the celestial and spiritual things contained in it, as is sufficiently 
proved by the existence of societies of the New Jerusalem in 
a large part of the kingdoms of Europe, and in North America. 
Thus, in consequence of the state of things, and of the free- 
will of which man cannot be deprived, the Lord could only found 
a Christian Church that must necessarily perish, as He Himself 
announced, but which was at the same time to conduct Human- 
ity to another church, the crown of the whole edifice, which 
should exist forever, because it would be able to compre- 
hend and receive celestial and spiritual things. 

In support of the assertion, that there would have been no 
Christian Church, or that it would not have lasted out its time, 
if the Lord had revealed the internal sense of the Word, I will 
cite this fundamental truth of the New Church, viz. : that the 
Lord Jesus Christ is God Himself, and that there is no other God 
than He. If the Lord had said openly to the Jews that He was 
Jehovah, no one would have believed in His Word, and He would 
have had no disciples ; or even if after His Ascension He had 
announced clearly in the Evangelist that He was Jehovah, His 
disciples would have made few proselytes, and Christianity 
would not have been sustained, as is evident from the discus- 
sions that have arisen upon the person of Jesus Christ 



240 



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in the Councils, and especially in the Council of Nice, where, 
in order to save Christianity, and prevent it from falling into 
Arianism, they were obliged to admit three persons into the 
Trinity. 

It now remains for me to inform you briefly how the celes- 
tial and spiritual things contained in the Word of the Old and 
New Testaments have been revealed to men by the Lord for the 
establishment of the New Jerusalem, His New Church. The 
Lord has followed in this, as in all other things, the laws of His 
Divine Order, from which He never deviates. As He opened 
the spiritual man of the Prophets, in order to transmit His 
Word, so He opened the spiritual man of a modest and pious 
Savant in order to reveal the internal sense of this Word. 
There is, however, this difference, that the Prophets were blind 
instruments, inasmuch as they did not comprehend what they 
announced, or understood only the letter of it, whilst the Reve- 
lator of the internal sense of the Word was to be put in a state 
to comprehend that sense, in order that he might develop e it 
rationally. It is for this reason that the Lord chose a Savant 
versed in all human sciences, in order that he might show the 
relations of the sciences with celestial and spiritual things ; 
and it is also for this reason that Swedenborg, before commen- 
cing the publication of his writings, was initiated into the knowl- 
edge of spiritual things by a daily communication of many 
years with spirits and angels. 

Accept, &c. 



LETTER III. 

In my last letter I gave you an historical expose, so to speak, 
of the Word, by showing you first the Word in its principle ; 
then, the Word engraven interiorly in the depth of the heart 
of the men of the Most Ancient Church ; afterwards, the Word 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



241 



given to the men of the Ancient Church, in a compilation 
written according to the correspondences hetween natural things 
and spiritual things ; and finally, a new Word written also ac- 
cording to these correspondences, viz. : our Bible containing the 
Old and New Testament ; and you have seen that in these 
various phases, the Word [La Parole'] has never ceased to he 
the Word [Le Verbe] or Divine Wisdom. Now, to neglect no 
means of confirming in you this important truth, I am going to 
attempt to complete this expose by some considerations drawn 
from analogy. 

Man having been created in the image of God, everything 
that exists in him, so far as he remains in the order of his 
creation, must be the image of something that exists in God; 
thus, there must be a kind of analogy between the Word of 
man and the Word of God. Let us see, then, if this analogy 
confirms what has been said of the Word of God. 

We have said that the Word in its principle, or first cause, 
created the Universe, that is, everything that God has made. 
Is the case similar in regard to the Word of man relatively to 
everything that man makes 1 

By the Word creating the universe, we have understood the 
Divine Wisdom or understanding of God, acting from the Di- 
vine Love or from the Will of God. With man the word 
analagous to the Word is therefore the understanding acting 
from the will, or, what is the same thing, the thought acting from 
the affection. Now, it is very evident that everything that man 
does is done by his thought from his affection ) every work of 
man is therefore done by his word. Thus considered, the word of 
man is not merely what he expresses, whether by sounds and 
articulations, or by the expression of the countenance and by 
gestures, but also everything that is produced by him ; so that 
this word of man is man himself, as the Word is God Himself, 
for the will and thought are man, as Love itself and Wisdom 
itself are God. 



242 



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We have said that with the men of the Most Ancient 
Church this Word was engraven upon the bottom of the heart. 
Is there^ anything in this analogous to the word of man, or, in 
other terms, to what man says and does ? 

The analogy was complete in relation to the men of the Most 
Ancient Church who remained in the order of creation, and it 
would likewise be complete in reference to the man of the pres- 
ent day, should he live conformably to the laws of order ; for 
then, whatever he should say and do, would be the expression 
of his thought which is at the bottom of his heart ; but if, 
when man remains in the order of his creation, everything that 
exists in him is the image of something that exists in God, it is 
no longer so when he has perverted this order; whatever arises 
from the abuse of some one of his faculties is still, it is true, in 
relation with something that exists in God, but it is no longer 
as an image, it is as something opposite or contrary. Hence it 
happens that, at the present day, all that man says and does is 
not always the expression of his thought which is at the bottom 
of his heart. 

As to the two written Words, namely, that of the Ancient 
Church and our Bible, there is also an analogy between them 
and the written word of man ; but as the Word of the Ancient 
Church and the Bible were written according to the same 
principles, we shall speak only of the Bible. 

We have said that the Bible or written Word is also the Di- 
vine Wisdom or Word \Le Verbe], and, consequently, God Him- 
self. In regard to man, in the acceptation in which we have 
taken the word, there is a written word, when what he says is 
fixed by writing or by printing, and also when what he does is 
a work that has tangible existence, as, for example, a painting, 
a statue, a monument. Now, it is very evident that the man is 
found in this book or in this w^ork, such as he was himself when 
he composed it or when he made it ; that is to say, with the 
thought proceeding from the affection which he then had. Thus 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



243 



they say of a sincere author, that he is entirely in his writings ; 
the painter is also in his pictures ; the sculptor in his statues, the 
architect in his monuments, although each of these preserves 
his own personality separate from his works. 

Is not the case similar with God % God is entirely in the Bi- 
ble, that is to say, in his Divine Word, which becomes fixed by 
means of printing, since this Divine Word is the Divine Thought 
or Divine Wisdom proceeding from the Divine Affection or Di- 
vine Love ; but he is in it as a sincere author is in his writings. 
Thus, although wholly in each copy of the Bible to him who 
seeks Him there with love and faith, God nevertheless preserves 
His Divine Personality without or separate from the entire uni- 
verse which is his work, as an author preserves his own per- 
sonality without or separate from his writings. 

Let us still continue the analogy. Although the author of a 
book written with candor and sincerity is wholly in that book, 
he does not manifest himself in the same manner to all those who 
read it, or, rather, all his readers do not see him there in the same 
manner. The majority, far from seeking to see him there, do 
not even think of him while reading ; others see him only super- 
ficially ; some, on the contrary, endeavoring to seek him in each 
phrase, and even in each expression, succeed from day to day 
in knowing him better. 

Is it not so with God in relation to the readers of the Bible ? 
Those who do not seek God in the Bible, or who read it without 
thinking of God, cannot see him in it ; those who desire to have 
no other knowledges of God than those which they have re- 
ceived by tradition, see him in it only„ superficially ; those, on the 
contrary, who desire to have a more exact knowledge of God, 
with the intention of learning how to live a better life, see God 
in each phrase, and even in each expression of this Holy Book. 

These considerations upon the analogy between the word of 
man and the Word of God, lead me to speak also of the differ- 
ence that exists between the books of men and the Bible 



244 



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The book of man contains only that kind of truth that exists 
in the spirit of the author ; but the Books of which the Bible is 
composed, having been written according to correspondences be 
tween natural and spiritual things, in order that they might be 
comprehended in this world by men, and at the same time in the 
other by spirits and angels, contain every kind of truth, from 
that which is adapted to the most imperfectly developed human 
understanding, to that which is suited to the most elevated an- 
gelic intelligence. 

When you look at a work of man, whether a painting or a 
statue, after having seen the surface of it, you have seen all of 
it. It is not so with the works of God ; whatever may be the 
exterior beauties of these works, dissection and the microscope 
would reveal to you interior beauties still more wonderful ; and 
the savant who has pushed his researches to the last limits of 
science, still continues convinced that what he has discovered is 
very far below what remains unknown to him. Every one 
knows, it is true, that there is an immense difference between 
the works of God and the works of man ; but a great number, 
regarding the Bible as only a human composition of great anti- 
quity, it would be necessary, in order to lead them to consider 
it as a work of God, to prove to them that there is between it 
and an ordinary book the same difference as between the works 
of God and the works of man. Now, from what has just beeu 
said, you see that the difference between the works of God and 
the works of man consists principally in this, that the works of 
God, from the lowest degree on the scale of beings to the high- 
est, have an interior organization beyond what appears in their 
exterior form. It is important, therefore, to prove that the Bi- 
ble has also an interior organization, which does not appear in its 
exterior form, or in its letter ; and that, like all the other works 
of God, although infinitely superior, since it is It which, in its 
quality of Word, has created all, it presents to the scalpel and 
the microscope of illustrated human intelligence interior beau 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 



245 



ties, which become so much more wonderful as one penetrates 
deeply into it. This interior organization, which the Lord has 
Himself signalized, by saying that His words are Spirit and Life, 
is the internal sense enveloped in the external or literal sense of 
the Bible. 

Farther on, when we shall together penetrate into the internal 
sense, you will acquire the entire conviction that this sense con- 
tains marvels more and more wonderful, and that thus the Bible, 
according to the expression itself of the Lord, is Spirit and Life. 

Yet one observation before terminating this general expose. 
From the fact that the Bible, as the Word of God, is God Him- 
self manifesting his Divine Love by his Divine Wisdom, it fol- 
lows that it contains the Infinite, and that, consequently, it is in- 
exhaustible and impenetrable as to its inmost ; inexhaustible, in- 
asmuch as man and angel will be able continually and forever 
to draw new knowledges from this Divine Source without its 
ever being drained ; impenetrable as to its inmost, inasmuch as 
man and angel will never be able to know all- that it contains ; 
but although impenetrable as to its inmost, it is not for that less 
adapted to all the spiritual and celestial wants of men and an- 
gels, by means of its spiritual and celestial senses which are suc- 
cessively accessible. It is even because that the Word is inex- 
haustible and impenetrable as to its inmost, that man can enjoy, 
as well as angels, a happiness which will continually increase 
during all eternity. In fact, angels as well as men live only by 
their affections and thoughts ; now, whatever is the degree of 
love and of wisdom to which an angel has arrived, he will al- 
ways be able to draw from the Word affections more and more 
filled with love, and thoughts more and more profound, without 
however ever being able to penetrate as far as the inmost. Sup- 
pose, on the contrary, the angel a perfect being in the strict ac- 
ceptation of the word, having no more new affections or new 
thoughts to acquire, because that he would be in possession of 
all ; what would become of his life 1 Would it be really living 



246 



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to be in view of eternity and without hope of ever obtaining any 
new affection or new thought? Would it not rather be only a 
state of ennui, produced by satiety, which would be entirely in 
supportable % I conceive that God is perfect, because that God 
is constantly delighted in his work, upon which he acts unceas- 
ingly in order that it may become more and more his image ; but 
I cannot conceive of a single creature being perfect, because 
that then that creature would be God, and there can be only one 
God. 

Such, my dear sir, is the Divine Word, the inexhaustible 
source of Love and Wisdom, the inestimable treasury from 
whence men can in this world, and will be able hereafter, in the 
future life, eternally to draw good affections and pure thoughts ; 
and yet the Book that contains it is misunderstood by a majority 
of Christians; for the largest number among these have the 
greatest indifference for the Bible, others despise it, and those 
who have any respect for it, explain it in a manner so opposed 
to the Justice of God, that their commentaries often prevent the 
Divine Wisdom from being discovered in it. 

We will soon study this Divine Book together according to 
your desire ; and then the truths in it which have been adapted 
to the human understanding will become successively developed 
before your eyes, if you persevere, as I hope you will, in seek- 
ing them with love, that is with the firm desire of applying them 
to your life, in order to become a new man. But in order that 
this study of the Bible may become more easy for you, I must 
still remove certain prejudices, and cause certain obstacles to dis- 
appear which would retard our progress. 

Prejudices. — There are particularly two prejudices, which it 
is important for me to remove immediately, because that Philo- 
sophy, having seized upon them as argument with which to 
combat the Bible, they may have left upon your mind a some- 
what unfavorable impression. 

First Prejudice. — The Jews considered as the People of God. 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



247 



The Theology of the Old Church, founding itself upon the 
letter of the Word without seeking the spirit of it, has diffused 
through all Christendom this false idea, that the Jews, "before the 
coming of the Lord, were the only people of God, all the other 
nations of the earth having been rejected; in like manner, it also 
pretends, supporting itself by the letter of the New Testament, 
that, since the establishment of Christianity, Christians only can 
he saved. 

Instead of combating this false idea, Philosophy has seized 
upon it as a pretext to attack the God of the Jews, supporting 
itself upon such attributes of the Divinity as no one can dispute ; 
as for example, upon the Justice and Goodness of God. There 
is no one, in fact, who can dispute the first of these attributes ; 
and whatever difference there may be between Divine Justice and 
human justice, it is always the case that true human justice is a 
reflection of Divine Justice, and that, consequently, that which is 
generally regarded as unjust by men, cannot belong to Divine 
Justice. Neither can anyone dispute the second attribute ; and 
notwithstanding the difference that exists between the goodness 
or love of God towards men, and the goodness or love of a fa- 
ther for his children, it is not less true that paternal goodness is 
a reflection of Divine goodness, and thus that that which is gen- 
erally regarded as opposed to paternal goodness, can in no wise 
belong to the Divine goodness. Now, would not the father of 
a numerous family be generally considered as unjust and devoid 
of a goodness really paternal, if he should love and cherish for 
his heir only one of his children, to the exclusion of all the 
others ; or, if all his children being obnoxious to him, he should 
save Only one of them and condemn all the others to destruction? 
A.s this is incontestible, Philosophy concludes that God being 
Justice itself, and Goodness itself, the God of the Bible was not 
the true God, since he had condemned en masse all the nations 
of the earth to an eternal damnation, and had taken care only 
of the Jewish nation, which was as ferocious and as barbarous 
11* 



248 



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as other nations, and which even surpassed them often in tha 
refinement of cruelty. 

Philosophy was therefore combating the Bible, not indeed 
with the Bible, as it pretended, but with the false ideas dissem- 
inated by Theology ; and the latter, far from seeking to rectify 
these ideas, intrenched itself behind the antiquity of the Bible 
and the respect with which it had been invested ; or when it 
was necessary to answer reproaches made against the Jewish 
nation and its principal personage s, it considered itself obliged 
to resort to all possible means for extenuating their actions, 
even though they were most clearly opposed to all the prin- 
ciples of justice, of morality, or of humanity. Thus, Theology, 
instead of again seizing the advantage over its adversary, fur- 
nished him by these very means, with new weapons against itself. 

But the true Theology, which was given by the Lord in the 
writings of Swedenborg, could have nothing to fear from a 
contest with Philosophy, for this Theology is founded upon the 
principle that God is Love Itself, Justice Itself, and Mercy Itself 3 
and none of its doctrines, as you will presently see, is contradic- 
tory to these Divine Attributes, which Philosophy cannot dispute. 
Thus the weapons which Philosophy used with so much' suc- 
cess in the last century, and at the commencement of the present, 
would now be attended with no danger, since the true Theology 
explains in a most satisfactory manner, what is to be understood 
in the Bible by the People of God. 

If the descendants of Jacob have been called the People of 
God, it is because they had been chosen to be a representative 
of the Church • and you have seen in my last letter, that if the 
Jews have been chosen rather than any other nation, it is not 
because they had been less corrupt. Now, as it is a general 
law of representation, that the thought is not occupied with the 
person or thing which represents, but that everything has rela- 
tion to the thing represented, and that thus it matters little 
who or what the person is who represents, it follows that the 



MAN OF THE WORLD, 243 

Jewish nation, however abominable it might be, was, in the 
sense of the letter, necessarily called the People of God, since 
it represented the Church of the Lord, which is composed of all 
those who acknowledge one God and live in good, whatever 
be their external mode of worship ; and that Jewish personages 
were, also, in certain circumstances, necessarily called the 
elect of God, however blameable had been their conduct in oth 
er respects. 

Far from seeking to extenuate the base and atrocious actions 
committed by the Jewish people, and by their principal person- 
ages, the true Theology leaves them in all their weight, just as 
they are related in the Bible : it by no means considers the Jews 
as the People of God in the sense of a privileged people, nor 
any of their chiefs, pontiffs, kings, or prophets, as the elect of 
God in the common acceptation of that word ; for this would be 
to do injury to God, in whose view all men are equal ; it is the 
life alone that makes a difference between men ; thus, to appre- 
ciate the character of any one, we must consider his life, and 
not the function with which he is charged. Farther on, I shall 
often have occasion to speak to you of the Jewish nation, and to 
show it to you under its true aspect ; it will be sufficient for the 
present to refer you to No. 433 of the Apocalypse Explained, 
where you will find interesting details upon the origin of the 
Jews, upon their character, and upon their faith. 

Second Prejudice. — The Pentateuch considered as the source 
whence all the nations of antiquity have derived their religious 
ideas. 

The old Theology founding itself upon this true principle, 
that without Revelation man could have known no spiritual 
truth, has hence concluded, and still pretends, that all the 
nations of antiquity have derived from the books of the Jews 
all their religious ideas which have any affinity with those 
that are contained in the Pentateuch. 

Such a pretension had nothing in it very prejudicial to the 



250 



LETTERS TO A 



Bible, so long as Philosophy dared not enter into open contro 
versy ; but it became very injurious from the commencement 
of that controversy, and especially since the theogonies and 
chronologies of ancient nations have been studied with more 
care ) for it is no longer merely Philosophy that combats this 
pretension, it is science also, supported by all modern discov- 
eries. In face of so many proofs, which at the present day at- 
test the high antiquity of the nations of the East, in face of 
so many vestiges which prove the existence of a civilization 
far anterior to our historical times, how can any one dare still 
to pretend, that all the nations of the earth have drawn their 
religious notions from the books of the Jews, the most ancient 
of which do not go back, at farthest, more than three thousand 
and four or five hundred years % Is this not acting against the 
Bible, rather than in its defence % 

The arguments which Dupuis has accumulated in his Origin 
of all hinds of Worship, are overwhelming against the old 
Theology ) but what can they avail against the Bible and 
against the true Theology % Nothing ; absolutely nothing. If 
Dupuis proves incontestably that the Orientals have borrowed 
nothing from a miserable people that lived in a retired corner of 
Asia, this proof is overwhelming only to the old Theology, which 
maintains the contrary ; but it is without any force against the 
Bible, when the Bible is separated from its unwise defenders ; 
it is also without any force against the true Theology, since th^ 
latter acknowledges that the Orientals have borrowed nothing 
from the Mosaic Word. 

What is peculiar in this contest, is the fact that Philosophy 
and Theology are both in error; for Philosophy retorting 
against its adversary, maintains that the Jews have invented 
nothing and have copied everything ; or> in other words, that 
the Pentateuch has been drawn from the theogonies of the 
Orientals. 

Upon this point, as upon almost all others, it is only in the 



MAN OF THE WORLD. 



251 



writings of Swedenborg that the truth can be found. You 
have seen by my last letter, that, anterior to the Word given to 
the descendants of Jacob, there had been in the Ancient Church 
a written Word; and that this Ancient Church, far from being 
confined to a small colony, extended over the largest part of the 
globe, and flourished principally in Syria, the Land of Canaan, 
Mesopotamia, Arabia, Chaldea, Assyria, Egypt, Nineveh, 
Tyre and Sidon. Now, Theologians of the old church cannot 
deny the existence of this Ancient Word, since the Bible con- 
tains some fragments of it, and gives us even the names of 
the two parts of which it was composed; and on the opposite 
side, philosophers and savants, who carry back the theog- 
onies of the Orientals and of other ancient nations to an epoch 
anterior to Moses, when there existed upon our globe an ad- 
vanced civilization, the vestiges of w T hich they are collecting 
with avidity, have, consequently, no motive for denying the ex- 
istence of this ancient Church. Now, therefore, difficulties 
vanish ; if the ancient theogonies have all points of resem- 
blance between them and our Bible, it is because they are all 
derived from the same source, the written Word of the Ancient 
Church 3 and if they differ, it is because this church having 
fallen, the science of correspondences, the only key of that 
Word, has been lost, and their worship having become idola- 
trous, each nation made for itself a particular theogony, founded 
however upon the original types of which they had no longer 
any knowledge. Thus all the systems of cosmogony and of 
worship of ancient times, were only adulterations more or less 
gross of the ante-Mosaic Word. 

This explanation, as you see, leaves untouched the principle, 
that without revelation, man could have known no spiritual 
truth : and at the same time it protects the Bible against all at- 
tack, so far as it concerns the points of resemblance that it has 
with the theogonies of the ancient nations, for these points of 
resemblance arise from the fact, that the first seven chapters of 



252 



LETTERS TO A 



Genesis constituted a part of the Word of the Ancient Church, 
and have been extracted from it. 

Obstacles. — These consist of a great number of charges and 
objections. For the present I shall examine only the three fol- 
lowing points, which contain the most serious charges and ob- 
jections. 

I. Jehovah in the Bible gives himself up to vengeance, anger, 
and other human passions. This charge, which the old Theology- 
is unable to answer, remains without force and falls to the ground 
as soon as it is known that the Word, being Written according 
to correspondences between spiritual and natural things, is ex- 
pressed according to appearances and the fallacies of the senses. 
" Jehovah-God, or the Lord," says Swedenborg, M never curses 
any one, he is never angry with any one, he never leads any 
into temptation ; he punishes none, much less does he curse 
any. Such things can never proceed from the source of mercy, 
of peace and goodness. If it is said in the Word that Jehovah- 
God not only turns away his face, is angry, punishes, tempts, 
but also that he kills, and even curses, it is in order that men 
may believe that the Lord governs and disposes all things in 
general and in particular, even evil itself, punishments and temp- 
tations • and after this most general idea has been received, that 
they may learn how he governs and disposes all things, and 
that he turns the evil of punishment and of temptation into good ; 
it is from things most general that the order of teaching and of 
learning in the Word commences ; hence the literal sense abounds 
in such most general things." A. C. n. 245. He further adds, 
44 All these expressions have been used, in order that persuasions 
and lusts might not be broken, but bent ; for to speak otherwise 
than according to man's comprehension, — and he comprehends 
only according to appearances, fallacies and persuasions, would 
have been to sow seed in the waters, and to say things that 
would be instantly rejected." A. C. n. 1874. Jehovah has 
therefore presented himself in this manner in the Bible, because 



MAN OF THE WORLD 



253 



of the barbarity and ferocity of the descendants of Jacob, who 
could not have conceived of God otherwise. But if God does 
not punish, who is it that punishes ? The true Theology replies : 
Evil itself punishes itself ; that is, the wicked plunge themselves 
into the pain that corresponds to the evil that they have com- 
mitted. 

II. Facts and expressions that offend against morality. One 
of the gravest charges which Philosophy makes against the Bi- 
ble, is that it presents pictures of manners which could be toler- 
ated only in an uninspired book. 

The best answer given by the old Theology is this ; that every 
thing is impure to him whose heart is impure, but that every 
thing is pure to him whose heart is pure. This is very true, 
and it is for this reason that there is no danger in putting the 
Bible into the hands of a person of a pure heart. But as this an- 
swer is far from satisfying philosophers, since it gives no indica- 
cation why such pictures are found in the Bible, I am going to 
present you with the additions which true Theology has made 
to it. 

The Bible gives us, it is true, the history of the Jewish nation , 
but that which constitutes the principal subject of the Bible, 
since it is the Word of God, is not. properly the history of the 
Jewish nation, it is the relation of certain historical facts, which 
by their correspondence, represent the spiritual states which the 
Lord wished to present in his Word. In fact, of what conse- 
quence to all the nations of the earth, and to all future ages 
could be a history of this little people written like that of other 
nations ? Not any, assuredly; but the case is not so in regard 
to the historical facts which the Bible contains concerning the 
Jewish people, they are of very great importance to us ; and 
that, because they have been transmitted as representatives, and 
have been expressed by words, all of which, even to the leas: 
iota, are significative ; for it is this only that imprints upon an 9 
written composition the character of the Word of God. Thus 



254 



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when the history of a patriarch, of a judge, of a king, or of any 
other personage is treated of, there are given of his entire life only 
those facts, whether general or particular, which are adapted 
to represent in a series, the spiritual states which God thus en- 
veloped m a literal sense, in order to fix them so that they 
might serve for a communication of the spiritual world with the 
natural world ) whereas, in relation to all other facts, no mention 
is made of them ; and this explains the reason why there appear 
to he gaps in the Bihle, when it is considered merely as a histo- 
ry of the Jews. 

If we now inquire what the facts are that were to he more 
particularly collected together in the Bible, we shall see that they 
are precisely those whose relation most offends the ears of our 
philosophers. In fact, the Word in its internal sense treats only 
of the Lord, of the church, and of men considered as a church ; 
in every part of it the celestial marriage is treated of, that is, the 
marriage of the Lord with the church, which is the marriage of 
good with truth ) and in the opposite sense, the infernal marriage, 
which is the marriage of evil with the false. Thus whenever 
the church was to he treated of as in evil and the false, and con- 
sequently perverted, this state was to he represented, and was rep- 
resented in the historical hooks, by whatever constitutes the in- 
fernal marriage, that is, by facts of adultery, of prostitution, and 
even of incest, and in the prophetical books by expressions 
which describe infamous acts of debauchery. 

III. Indifferent assertions quite unworthy of the attention of 
God; contradictions in historical circumstances ; contradictory 
propositions. These objections which the old Theology has been 
entirely unable to remove, you may easily render void by means 
of the knowledge which you now have of the Bible. 

You know that the Bible was written according to correspond- 
ences that exist between spiritual things and natural things ; you 
know that its end is the regeneration of man by means of the 
knowledge of important truths of the spiritual sense ) you know 



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in fine, that the literal sense was destined to serve as an envel- 
ope to this spiritual sense, and not to perfect man in natural 
knowledge. Thus when you find in the Bihle passages which 
seem to relate exclusively to things that are indifferent and un- 
worthy of the attention of God, you will he convinced that there 
are concealed other things much more interesting. When you 
shall find any contradiction in historical circumstances, you will 
come to the conclusion that it was necessary for the letter to 
bend in some respects under the weight of important matters that 
are contained in its interiors, and that, to express these more 
fully, some slight deviation must necessarily he made in the lit- 
eral narrative ; for every composition should he judged according 
as it is appropriate to the end of the author, and in the Bible God's 
end was the spiritual rather than the natural. Finally, when 
you meet with two contradictory propositions, such as the fol- 
lowing : " God repents,"— Gen. vi. 6, — and " God does not re- 
pent," Numb. xx. 19 — how can the two assertions be true in the 
same sense, and yet as they must be true in a certain sense, since 
they are both in the Bible, you will conclude that one is a truth 
entirely naked, and that the other is covered under the veil of a 
simple appearance formed in human ideas ; thus that one is a 
real truth in connection with the spiritual sense, and the other 
an apparent truth, which, to become real, must be rectified by 
the spiritual sense. 

I shall terminate my letter by this question which has been 
often put to me. 

Since the true theology has nothing to fear from philosophy, 
why did not the Lord make it known sooner, in order to enlight- 
en men, and prevent his Word from being outraged ? 

I shall first remark that the principles upon which this theol- 
ogy is founded are not new, and they are all plainly expressed in 
the literal sense of the Bible, although not united in a body ; but 
I must add, that as soon as the Apostolic Doctrine, which renders 
faith subordinate to charity, had begun to be no longer regarde d 



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as the sole and only doctrine, Christianity became a prey to 
heresies, which multiplied to infinity ; that hence sects arose ; 
that each sect always found in the Bible certain passages to sup- 
port its own doctrine, and that then it regarded these passages a3 
the summary of the law, and passed over all those that could 
not be made to agree with their doctrine ; that each sect thus 
made for itself a doctrine of its own, and was no longer able to 
see the principles of the true theology in the Bible, although 
these principles were nevertheless expressed there in very ex- 
plicit terms. Hence, it is evident that Christians can have no oc- 
casion to complain of having been left in the dark, since they 
have always had at their disposal true spiritual principles ; if 
they saw them not, or rather if they would not see them, it is 
because that love of self and of the world reigned in them ; but 
the simple of heart, who lived conformably to the precepts of the 
Decalogue, have always seen them, in spite of the theological 
errors that had been inculcated upon them. 

In regard to the true Theology itself, that is, as developed in a 
doctrinal body, and given by the Lord in the writings of Sweden- 
borg, it could not have been presented sooner to mankind ; if 
that had been possible, the Lord, who is Love Itself and Mercy 
Itself, would not have waited so long before making it known ; 
but the impossibility existed, because the Lord, conformably to 
the laws of Divine Order, never forces any one, and, consequent- 
ly, this doctrine could not have been received by any person. 
In fact, before Philosophy had attacked Theology with so much 
vigor, the latter was ruling with absolute sovereignty both in 
Catholicism and in Protestantism ; woe to him who then dared 
to attack it, for it had recourse even to secular force, and the 
fagot was kindled. How can it be supposed that from that time 
it would have received, or permitted to be received, a doctrine 
which clearly shows that all the dogmas of Christianity have 
been falsified % Would it not rather have stifled it from its very 
first appearance 1 In order that the New Doctrine might be able 



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257 



to be brought to light, without being immediately annihilated, it 
was necessary that a breach should first be made upon the old 
Theology itself by Philosophy, and that it should thus lose a 
great part of the ascendancy which it had taken both over gov- 
ernments and people. Besides, that which clearly proves that 
the New Doctrine, if it had been given before, would have 
been received by no one, is the fact that at its appearance it 
was adopted by but a very small number of men ; and although 
Swedenborg had sent gratuitously the works containing it to 
prelates of various Christian denominations, to Universities and 
to the principal public libraries, the theology which might have 
drawn thence arguments against its adversary, proudly dis- 
dained that anchor of safety which the Lord offered it; and 
after the example of the synagogue, it preferred darkness to 
light. 

The Lord therefore could not have prevented his Divine 
Word from being outraged. Yet you are not to suppose that the 
greatest outrages that the Word of the Lord has had to bear, 
have proceeded from Philosophy; the scoffs that Philosophy 
hurled against the Bible, the sarcasms that it lavished upon it, 
the contempt with which it regarded it, all this was but little, 
compared with the outrages which it received on the part of 
Theology. Philosophy, it is true, attacked the Bible with fury, 
but it did not profane it, because it did not acknowledge it as the 
Word of God ; and besides, in its blindness it had some correct 
notions of God, for it represented him as just, good, and loving all 
men, and it was indignant at the bare idea, that the evil passions 
of man should be attributed to Him. Theology, on the contrary, 
acknowledged the Bible as the Word of God, and yet ceased not 
to commit outrages against It, blaspheming It, even when it ap- 
peared to defend it with the most favor. And, in fact, is there 
a greater outrage against God, than to attribute to Him the worst 
of human passions, partiality, injustice, jealousy, vengeance and 
cruelty % Are not these passions so entirely in opposition to 



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the attributes of Divinity, tacitly comprised in the dogmas of the 
old Theology ^ These are the greatest blasphemies against God, 
and it is by dogmas thus falsified that the Divine Word is most 
basely outraged. 

This is, moreover, confirmed by facts which transpired at the 
time of the first coming of the Lord. There were then in Judea 
many sects; that of the Pharisees, which was the principal, had 
acquired a reputation for its rigidity ; it had added to the Law 
oral tradition, and thus had made itself the interpleader of the 
Law, which procured it much veneration. The sect of the Phar- 
isees taught the resurrection, whilst that of the Sadducees de- 
nied it ; well, it was not the Sadducees whom the Lord blames 
most, for when they came scoffingly to ask Him a question, He 
merely told them that they erred, — Matth. xxii. : — -but He acted 
quite differently towards the Pharisees, those rigid observers of 
tradition and the law as interpreted by them ; He treated them 
with the greatest rigor, He called them hypocrites, fools, blind, 
whitened sepulchres, serpents, a generation of vipers, — -Matth. 
xxiii. In the relation of the Passion of the Lord, the Evangel- 
ists say nothing of the Sadducees, but they show us that the 
High-Priests and the Scribes were all set against Him ; and it is 
even said in Matthew, that the Pharisees called him an impos- 
tor,— xxvii. 62, 63. The greatest enemies of the Lord, therefore, 
whilst He lived in the world, were not tne Philosophers or Saddu- 
cees, but the High-Priests, Scribes and Pharisees ; these are they 
who crucified Him ; Him the incarnate Word, the Divine Word ; 
and as similar things always take place at the end of each church, 
this same Word has received again like outrages on the part of 
the Pharisees of Christianity. 

From these facts, which show so clearly that the Sadducees 
were less culpable than the Pharisees, it seems well established, 
that modern Philosophy has also been less culpable than Theol- 
ogy ; and even at the present time, it is not so much Philosophy 
as the old Theology that will place itself in opposition to thp 



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259 



establishment of the New Church, which the Lord is now insti- 
tuting. Philosophy dreads the spiritual principle, only because 
it always has in view the horrors that have been committed for 
more than three thousand years in the name of that principle ; 
it is not surprising, therefore, that it manifests much reserve and 
even distrust; but it will not always be hostile, and it will sur- 
render itself to evidence. The old Theology, on the contrary, 
always thinks of the power which it formerly had; it mourns 
over its loss, and despairs not of again coming in possession of 
it, at least in part ; it will, consequently, make constant efforts to 
extinguish the spiritual light of the New Church. Moreover, 
true Theology is not incompatible with true Philosophy ; Phi- 
losophy, therefore, has no occasion for fearing destruction ; it 
will only be modified, and will preserve its distinguished rank, 
but as a subordinate, and without pretending to occupy the first 
place. False Theology, on the contrary, cannot exist in con- 
currence with true Theology, the triumph of the latter will be 
the annihilation of the former. 

Accept, &c. 



THE END. 



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